How many aspies have been in abusive relationships?

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What nature of relationship have you been involved in
I have only been in abusive relationships 17%  17%  [ 9 ]
I have never been in an abusive relationship, but have had normal relationships 11%  11%  [ 6 ]
I have been mostly in abusive relationships compared to normal ones 32%  32%  [ 17 ]
I have been in very few abusive relationships compared to normal ones 23%  23%  [ 12 ]
I have never had a relationship 17%  17%  [ 9 ]
Total votes : 53

Misslizard
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30 Apr 2022, 3:33 pm

IsabellaLinton wrote:
Misslizard wrote:
Victim of narcissistic abuse here, physical and mental.


Hugs Misslizard

Stay strong

You too.
The Survivor’s club.
Not that anyone chooses to join.


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HibikiHoujia
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21 Jun 2022, 5:25 am

I guess many of us are gullible. Narcissistic people can easily target and use us.

It's heartbreaking to see how many people with ASD had been abused.



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21 Jun 2022, 10:54 am

I've been in abusive friendships but not abusive relationships.


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21 Jun 2022, 11:11 am

Maybe I should've put an option for that.
It's 23 -11 if you count all abusive vs hardly any
Isabella: identify theft and attempted murder 8O 8O 8O
It's really bad



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21 Jun 2022, 11:35 am

Ettina wrote:
I've been hit on by abusive people, but I saw the red flags and noped out long before it could have progressed to a relationship.


Same. I've had many lucky escapes.


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21 Jun 2022, 5:11 pm

I have been in a couple of extremely abusive relationships/situations. I have PTSD.


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orbweaver
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26 Jun 2022, 10:31 pm

I've wanted to reply to this, but the abusive relationship I was in... is something I will never quite be over and it has taken me a lot of time to heal enough to move on. My partner never raised a finger, rarely even raised their voice, and I'm not even always sure what the abuse was. Was I abusing him, as he insisted? Was he abusing me? Were we abusing each other? WTF was going on? I spent the majority of the relationship desperately confused.

What's more is that he himself was autistic - or at least told me he had been diagnosed that (he was self-diagnosed when we were first together, but had extensive psychiatric misdiagnosis history). I am close with a number of people who are autistic, and my (current) partner is an ex-therapist. My (current) partner does not believe my ex was autistic. In fact, it's kind of weird, looking back on it, that my ex-partner wanted me to sever ties with the support system I had that was an ND-friendly social world. He tried to convince me that my (autistic, then-undiagnosed) best friend had acted sexually inappropriate with him - and in all the years I've known my bff, I've NEVER had a reason to believe she could possibly do that - to get me to cut ties. What's more is that my ex did not even bring this up until quite a while after it would've happened, and we'd spent time with that person in the meantime. This is what life was like with my ex. I never knew what was okay in the moment, that would turn out to be Not Okay six months later.

In posting about this, 13 years after I got out, part of me is afraid he will turn out to be on this board. He was (allegedly) diagnosed at the right point.

My ex convinced me I wasn't autistic, and I believed everything he ever told me. Just as he would take the absolute worst-faith interpretation of anything I said - I would take the best-faith interpretation of anything he said.

In some ways it was a nightmare of a relationship that was just like being with an abusive allistic, in terms of his expectations of me. Once he no longer believed I was autistic - this was about six months into living with him - now everything I did (which could previously be understood in terms of the autism) had some kind of secret, nefarious meaning and was because "people are only out to get what they can get" (something he said a lot) with me being no better than those "people."

I felt so off-center in this relationship, the entire time we were together and until I moved out. I told him one time, during an argument, that *I* felt like the autistic one, in a relationship with an NT. He blew up at me over that. Basically, any time I critiqued about anything, had any feedback about how I was treated, he'd blow up.

I don't even know what about him was true or not, just as he doesn't know what about me was true.

When we first got together, he basically mirrored and love-bombed me. He obsessively stalked me online and learned and memorized everything about me (I was his special interest). But some time after I moved in, I discovered he was also reading my diaries (because he'd bring up things I"d written in them years before we were together, and pick fights about it). I stopped keeping a diary after that. He was snooping on everything I did online, and picking fights about it. Then discovered I'd posted to a support group for people in s**t relationships... somehow (people have brought up that he must have used a keylogger).

He turned out to be a very different person from the one who got with me, got mad at me for "making" him be this person he wasn't (acknowledging that he masked his way into the relationship), and blamed some things in his life that were poor life choices, on me. He even blamed his attempted suicide on me (and his family blamed me, too) and then later changed his story about it really being an accident.

He would change his story on things a year later. Claimed to have an "elephant memory" because of his autism, then he'd remember some incident six months to a year later that he had been perfectly okay with at the time then he'd re-contextualize it in light of some new thing he'd realized, and suddenly it was bad. Things were always coming up that had never been discussed at the time they happened. And everyone close to him was wrapped around his little finger. He acted like he had zero support, but once I was deep into the relationship, he had all the support and I had none, and I was the Bad Guy. People close to him didn't believe I was autistic; they just thought I was using him. I as asked by some of them if I was on drugs (and I've been asked that before, as an aspect of my own autism.)

I was always off-center. We'd do okay for a few weeks, I'd think we were on the right track, then I'd get home from work and he'd suddenly be sour on me again. It was like a rollercoaster.

He also was in a very codependent friendship with someone with very decompensated BPD and that person and I were always being pitted against each other, but after I'd cut all my ties to everyone I was close to and was stuck with this person, BPD Best Friend suddenly became the good guy and I was the bad guy.

With my ex partner, I was perpetually confused, but I was always the one who was f*****g with HIS head, everything was MY fault, I was perpetually being cast as a liar. I wasn't autistic, I was just a bad person, I was immature, a game player, etc (and I've been called a game player in the past - because I'M PERPETUALLY CONFUSED in a majority of my social interactions.)

He absolutely disbelieved that I was autistic... but he hated everything autistic I did. I worked really hard to do better. Especially since I no longer believed I was autistic. I tried to keep a list of questions to ask him and topics to bring up. Things to remember to do. Likes and preferences (because you had to get these exactly right or it meant you didn't really love him).

The people close to me genuinely believe that I got grifted and that basically he was financially exploiting me. Which he probably was.

Then one day I had a talk with him, post-breakup, where he calmly and reasonably told me that he was much better now and the relationship had just been really toxic and I was a toxic influence on him and he was so glad I was out of his life.


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Last edited by orbweaver on 26 Jun 2022, 10:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.

auntblabby
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26 Jun 2022, 10:34 pm

^^^ :(



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27 Jun 2022, 4:01 am

orbweaver wrote:
Then one day I had a talk with him, post-breakup, where he calmly and reasonably told me that he was much better now and the relationship had just been really toxic and I was a toxic influence on him and he was so glad I was out of his life.
He may of been calmer at the time but he def was NOT better. If he was better he woulda been apologizing to you & trying to accept some responsibility. It sounds like he wanted to give you a figurative hard kick in the ass as you were going out the door. He was majorly gaslighting you.

I doubt he's on the autism spectrum & I f#cking hate autistic imposters like that because they're some of the reason people associate us autistics with major abusers. I've seen many posts in this forum over the years by women who were in very abusive relationships with someone they suspected or believed to be autistic. There's even been a website created for women to b!tch about abusive relationships they've been in with autistic men. I'm sure in some of those cases the woman were major abusers & their autistic was a scapegoat & diagnosed by the bitter women but I'm sure there's plenty of cases where the women were being majorly abused & had a major misconception about autism or the guy claimed to be autistic. Guys like your ex give us autistics a bad rep that I feel is very undeserved for the vast majority of us.

I really hope things are going well with your current partner. It may be great he's an ex therapist but I would suggest being watchful that he doesn't just see you as a patient to treat or a case study or something. My 2nd girlfriend was in college & taking some courses related to disabilities cuz her ideal job woulda been training emotional support dogs. Looking back I felt like I was a special project to her at times & that contributed to me acting out. This very well may not be the case with your current partner but it's good to be careful, especially since how badly your ex controlled & manipulated you.

I kinda worry I'm making my current girlfriend feel like some kinda psych patient cuz she has various issues she's dealing with & I really want to be supportive & help her feel better cuz I majorly love & worry about her but I do NOT want to fundamentally change who she is. I just want her to feel better mentally & physically. She is usually very supportive & accepting of me but I have changed in some ways & changed a bit of my behavior because it was problematic within our relationship. I feel a lot better mentally as a result of being with her & want to return the favor I guess. Our relationship is very interdependent.


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27 Jun 2022, 7:50 am

orbweaver, everything you posted there is classic narcissism.

I had a narcissist wife who actually was the one who discovered i was autistic...then she claimed to be autistic..but she had amazing social skills. She was a social skill genius, could charm anyone in 2 minutes.

In regards to that last comment your ex made. I've read tons of articles and apparently that is his genuine opinion of how things went down..but somewhere in his brain he knows that applies to you and not him. But his condition convinces him that he was the abused one. It's very strange.
I'm pretty darn certain that you were the abused one because you could furnish great detail and you have the same confusion that the victims usually have.


Now, here's something really confusing and mind blowing. My ex would explode in anger over little things, which would cause a loud and long argument. I would feel traumatised after, I would have to self sooth with food and other things for hours. She would be energized and feel great after an argument.

Then, when I would accuse her of being mean she would reference that website where women complain about their autistic husbands accusing them of things constantly!! !

So that website itself could be toxic people whose disease has convinced them they are victims.

Now, if you're totally confused and now doubting everything...its the abuser who seems to enjoy the arguments..its pretty simple. But they would post to a website that they dont enjoy them.

OK that doesnt help with the confusion because you could accuse me of doing the same but heres the actual proof:
I genuinely didnt enjoy them because im able to tell you how i felt after and what i did to deal with that. A narcissist wouldnt be able to tell you those things and would be superficial in the way they describe things happening.


I'm thinking about that website, I read it a long time ago, but it is majority women complaining about these autistic husbands being suspicious of them and accusing them of things. I dont go around accusing people of things unless something dodgy is afoot. Most of the time i've accused someone of something they were up to no good (not just a delusion of mine but police reports or the person getting in trouble with landlord)
. Most people I'm just neutral or friendly towards.

So that website is quite suspicious tbh




OK I did some research just now, there seem to be women with quite legitimate complaints and concerns posting on other sites, like general family sites. I cant find that website which is devoted to complaining about autistic husbands, it might have been taken down?



orbweaver
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27 Jun 2022, 12:48 pm

nick007 wrote:
orbweaver wrote:
Then one day I had a talk with him, post-breakup, where he calmly and reasonably told me that he was much better now and the relationship had just been really toxic and I was a toxic influence on him and he was so glad I was out of his life.
He may of been calmer at the time but he def was NOT better. If he was better he woulda been apologizing to you & trying to accept some responsibility. It sounds like he wanted to give you a figurative hard kick in the ass as you were going out the door. He was majorly gaslighting you.


Oh god yeah. Weirdly he actually did manage to go back to school successfully and become a professional after I left, and blamed the drama of our relationship (not owning any part of his part of it) for why he couldn't do these things while I lived there.

Quote:
I doubt he's on the autism spectrum & I f#cking hate autistic imposters like that because they're some of the reason people associate us autistics with major abusers. I've seen many posts in this forum over the years by women who were in very abusive relationships with someone they suspected or believed to be autistic.


In his case, he said that he got an official diagnosis while in the mental hospital (after the suicide attempt he blamed on me). I can decide here whether to believe him or not, of course. I don't know what was true or not. BTW, this was somebody who - regardless of whether or not they were autistic - was on hella different psych meds.

One of the big factors when we were together was that we *both* struggled with employment/etc, and *both* had our own support needs; his were okay but mine were heavily resented and I was basically just lazy and entitled.

Quote:
There's even been a website created for women to b!tch about abusive relationships they've been in with autistic men. I'm sure in some of those cases the woman were major abusers & their autistic was a scapegoat & diagnosed by the bitter women but I'm sure there's plenty of cases where the women were being majorly abused & had a major misconception about autism or the guy claimed to be autistic. Guys like your ex give us autistics a bad rep that I feel is very undeserved for the vast majority of us.


I don't doubt that at all! I've seen "Heartless Asperger's" and the FAAAS website.

I've seen that happen IRL in my social spaces - it's a reason some spaces I was in (that were VERY welcoming toward women in the 80s-90s, and have a strong participation rate of odd Boomer/Gen X women who are usually all ND themselves), became so paranoid and hedgy in the 00s about Millennial women entering them, because of the degree to which socially odd/inexperienced men basically got bullied (if the guy was a NEET or just an autistic who didn't have anything for them to exploit) out of the space by women, or exploited (if he was a tech worker - or even more, a NEET who had inherited a house) by the women who entered these spaces. It's an ugly side of the "Fake Geek Girls" discourse that nobody wants to admit exists, but I've seen it with my own eyes. It certainly doesn't help the case for women who were in these spaces because they're nerdy, gender-nonconforming, or autistic themselves. But there were definitely women who entered those spaces as predators, just as men entering yoga classes and other female-majority spaces as sexual predators is a known problem.

For what it's worth, my ex was (AFAB) trans, and hadn't begun transition during the majority of our relationship. (It's interesting to me that he was actually easier to break up with once he started testosterone, because his whole psychology and communication process changed overnight. The cruelty became more naked and blunt and less gamey. But - the issues of LGBTQ politics, both in a lesbian-optics relationship and in a relationship with a trans person, definitely contributed to the problems we had. The inability to really get support from either a mainstream therapist at the time - even my own therapist seemed to believe that women weren't actually abusers - or from LGBTQ spaces, especially after the transition began. Plus my partner wanting me to cut off all of my friendships, because a majority of them at the time were with cis men. It was like living in my own private little hell.)

Quote:
I really hope things are going well with your current partner. It may be great he's an ex therapist but I would suggest being watchful that he doesn't just see you as a patient to treat or a case study or something.


Much better. MUCH better. I am very pleased with this partner. He actually did not get that far as a therapist before deciding to go into tech instead (he is kinda disgusted with the whole profession of therapy for that matter), and never got licensed. It helps that I've known him a very, very long time - off and on for 20 years. I think I would not have entered another relationship if it weren't someone I already knew really well who (important to me, after my two messed up LTRs previously) sees and treats me as a basically competent person who just happens to have some problems/need some support (the way I see him). If it means anything, my partner is physically disabled (can't drive) and has ADHD, and we actually have similar early histories (so much of his early narrative having mild CP is like my early narrative as an autistic). I feel like that puts us on more equal footing. We both relate in terms of being intelligent people who have challenges and personal struggles, but who have complementary strengths and weaknesses from each other. It helps that the main social space I connected to him in (my tabletop gaming/sci fi world) is huuuuugely ND and that his best friend is probably on the spectrum himself. He connects hugely to the world outside of that too though and has lots of NT friends as well, and it frankly all mystifies me! I decided after my s**t relationship, then two burnouts, to center my life around ND-positive spaces, and that has made all the difference in my life.

Quote:
My 2nd girlfriend was in college & taking some courses related to disabilities cuz her ideal job woulda been training emotional support dogs. Looking back I felt like I was a special project to her at times & that contributed to me acting out. This very well may not be the case with your current partner but it's good to be careful, especially since how badly your ex controlled & manipulated you.


Oh geez, that's terrible.
I think that both of my exes previous to my partner saw me that way. I have been with my partner since 2016, and feel pretty good about this relationship, and am actually doing pretty well in it.

That has come to be a barometer for me, because I seemed to lose some degree of function in both of the relationships I was in before. I was also perpetually confused with them, and with my partner, I am never confused. BTW he is extremely blunt and direct and has no filter. He also takes me at absolute face value. And it works for me. I have never ever felt like I had to decode anything he was saying for hidden messages, or read his mind. We are so much on the same wavelength that sometimes I'm surprised he's not autistic. But he's not. What's amusing about our relationship is how much, when we got together, I was "one of the guys" in our friend group so I never even expected him to be attracted to me, but he was, and doesn't ask me to change anything. We both relate too over being told we aren't real men/real women because of our disabilities and differences and we just do the things we're good at (he likes to cook and I like to fix things).

Quote:
I kinda worry I'm making my current girlfriend feel like some kinda psych patient cuz she has various issues she's dealing with & I really want to be supportive & help her feel better cuz I majorly love & worry about her but I do NOT want to fundamentally change who she is. I just want her to feel better mentally & physically. She is usually very supportive & accepting of me but I have changed in some ways & changed a bit of my behavior because it was problematic within our relationship. I feel a lot better mentally as a result of being with her & want to return the favor I guess. Our relationship is very interdependent.


It's hard to know sometimes. It helps when the person can tell you what they need, but it's not always easy to articulate. I feel the same way about my partner, and like I feel so much healthier and more stable since being with him. Our relationship is very interdependent as well.

It is probably helpful that you are conscious of what you are looking out for in your dynamic with your girlfriend, and aware of the pitfalls.


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27 Jun 2022, 1:09 pm

Does that include all the imaginary ones? Those are the best. :jester:


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27 Jun 2022, 1:20 pm

klanka wrote:
orbweaver, everything you posted there is classic narcissism.

I had a narcissist wife who actually was the one who discovered i was autistic...then she claimed to be autistic..but she had amazing social skills. She was a social skill genius, could charm anyone in 2 minutes.


Ugh. What was it like past the surface charm?

My ex actually claimed that about me as to why I couldn't be autistic - because until my burnouts, I did well at a relatively surface level and made great first and second impressions (until you actually interact with me past surface/casual interaction - but I can give good job interview and good doctor appointment and good traffic stop), and because I actually did have a social circle (consisting exclusively of nerds/geeks, most of whom are ND, many of whom are unemployable - my best friend, from that same space, later came to be dx'd autistic as well). The funny thing is that yeah it looks like I'm socially a little more successful, but only because I've managed to move in a space consisting largely of NDs and physically disabled people. Pretty privilege also got me a little further as a teenager (and not worth much past that, on its own).

But another thing is that my ex was convinced I had BPD, not autism, because of seeing me mask/chameleon in real time ("you become like whoever you're around and I don't know who you really are") and because of my history of becoming obsessed with people. There was next to no discourse around female autism presentation at that time, though. It is actually discourse around female autism presentation that brought me back to realizing I was autistic all along.

Quote:
In regards to that last comment your ex made. I've read tons of articles and apparently that is his genuine opinion of how things went down..but somewhere in his brain he knows that applies to you and not him. But his condition convinces him that he was the abused one. It's very strange.
I'm pretty darn certain that you were the abused one because you could furnish great detail and you have the same confusion that the victims usually have.


Yeah, basically everything he hated that I did, was autistic stuff. Being too calm in a crisis where everyone is falling apart, not being able to read/interpret my expressions, hating that I was so obsessed with xyz, hating that I embarrassed him in public/around his family and said weird/embarrassing things, hating that I was totally brain fried on my off time (and not having empathy toward that - p sure though that the reason I'm here for my current partner at all is because I don't work outside the house anymore and haven't had to work full time).
And everything he thought might be BPD, was "female style" autistic stuff. (Another thing was that he somewhat depended on me and it was like he was the only one in the house allowed to be disabled... though ultimately I ended up much more debilitated than he did, and that relationship was a factor in my burning out.) It was also like we were in some kind of sick contest about who was more sick at the time.

(It doesn't help that I had a new clinician at the time think I *just* had ADHD. But at that point, it's like nothing I did, to my partner's mind, made sense anymore.)

One thing was that his expectations of me could be very black and white, harsh, and unyielding - practically setting me up to fail, and things like holding it against me that I didn't get him an exact specific thing for his birthday (without being able to empathize with me for not being able to find that thing) and he was far far more lacking in interpersonal empathy than the autistic people I'm close to. The autistic people I'm close to, would've actually been understanding about that once the explanation was given... or weren't expecting that to begin with.

My mind is mush during a lot of that time. It's like trying to replay an old video file but the data is corrupted and you're forced to piece things together. I always worry I'm remembering things wrong.

The irony is that up until his transition, he acted a lot more autistic. He started becoming socially much more gregarious afterward (which makes sense, I'm close to some other trans people and this is pretty common). He started being more experimental about foods and about scheduling his time and was no longer terrified of being out in public the way he'd been.

Quote:
Now, here's something really confusing and mind blowing. My ex would explode in anger over little things, which would cause a loud and long argument. I would feel traumatised after, I would have to self sooth with food and other things for hours. She would be energized and feel great after an argument.

Then, when I would accuse her of being mean she would reference that website where women complain about their autistic husbands accusing them of things constantly!! !


Oh JEEZ. It is like she set that whole thing up.

Quote:
So that website itself could be toxic people whose disease has convinced them they are victims.

Now, if you're totally confused and now doubting everything...its the abuser who seems to enjoy the arguments..its pretty simple. But they would post to a website that they dont enjoy them.


My ex tried to convince me that this was the case with *me* and that I craved the attention that casting him as the abuser, got me. Which in retrospect just sounds like abuser logic.

I really can't wrap my mind around somebody enjoying this kind of thing. I am glad that I no longer have to in my personal life.

The thing is with people like this, is that if you even are a conscientious person who has a checkered social history (especially with NTs and narcissists) then you don't want to be an abuser or seen as one, and might be worried that you are and or have a little tickle of doubt there, and that's easy to exploit.

Quote:
OK that doesnt help with the confusion because you could accuse me of doing the same but heres the actual proof:
I genuinely didnt enjoy them because im able to tell you how i felt after and what i did to deal with that. A narcissist wouldnt be able to tell you those things and would be superficial in the way they describe things happening.


It really doesn't help in my own circumstance that I'm highly alexithymic and it was worse then, I didn't *know* what I was feeling a majority of the time.

It scans to me, that my ex was narcissistic. I know from my experience dealing with other narcissists that basically you just can't call them out on anything, it'll just end up pointed back at you or you'll walk away feeling crazier than you started.

Quote:
I'm thinking about that website, I read it a long time ago, but it is majority women complaining about these autistic husbands being suspicious of them and accusing them of things. I dont go around accusing people of things unless something dodgy is afoot. Most of the time i've accused someone of something they were up to no good (not just a delusion of mine but police reports or the person getting in trouble with landlord)
. Most people I'm just neutral or friendly towards.

So that website is quite suspicious tbh


I only recently found out about Heartless Asperger's, that might be the one? But there's also FAAAS (Families of Adults Affected By Asperger's Syndrome). Sometimes I wonder if the people complained about actually have Asperger's at all, or if it's something the wife is gaslighting the husband about.

Quote:
OK I did some research just now, there seem to be women with quite legitimate complaints and concerns posting on other sites, like general family sites. I cant find that website which is devoted to complaining about autistic husbands, it might have been taken down?


It's interesting to me that the problem of NT-ND neurodiverse relationships, seems to be so highly gendered.

Do NT women (or even people with female upbringing in some cases, in the case of my ex) have specific problems interacting with autistic and ADHD people, that NT men have less of? What's going on here?

As someone who identified as/lived as a lesbian for a giant chunk of my adult life (until I got with my present partner) but has had a much harder time interacting with NT women than NT men, it is interesting to me.


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27 Jun 2022, 5:37 pm

orbweaver wrote:

Ugh. What was it like past the surface charm?



Not much, just obsessions,causing jealousy. Trolling to start arguments. Talking to other people in front of me for hours,but ignoring me.
It was very confusing, but in a quiet moment I would reflect and just think ...hang on a minute I dont like this person at all! What is going on, how did i marry someone like this? Before I learnt about narcissism.

orbweaver wrote:
My ex actually claimed that about me as to why I couldn't be autistic - because until my burnouts, I did well at a relatively surface level and made great first and second impressions (until you actually interact with me past surface/casual interaction - but I can give good job interview and good doctor appointment and good traffic stop), and because I actually did have a social circle (consisting exclusively of nerds/geeks, most of whom are ND, many of whom are unemployable - my best friend, from that same space, later came to be dx'd autistic as well). The funny thing is that yeah it looks like I'm socially a little more successful, but only because I've managed to move in a space consisting largely of NDs and physically disabled people. Pretty privilege also got me a little further as a teenager (and not worth much past that, on its own).

But another thing is that my ex was convinced I had BPD, not autism, because of seeing me mask/chameleon in real time ("you become like whoever you're around and I don't know who you really are") and because of my history of becoming obsessed with people. There was next to no discourse around female autism presentation at that time, though. It is actually discourse around female autism presentation that brought me back to realizing I was autistic all along.


BPD do crazy stuff to start arguments which I presume you didnt do.

orbweaver wrote:
Yeah, basically everything he hated that I did, was autistic stuff. Being too calm in a crisis where everyone is falling apart, not being able to read/interpret my expressions, hating that I was so obsessed with xyz, hating that I embarrassed him in public/around his family and said weird/embarrassing things, hating that I was totally brain fried on my off time (and not having empathy toward that - p sure though that the reason I'm here for my current partner at all is because I don't work outside the house anymore and haven't had to work full time).
And everything he thought might be BPD, was "female style" autistic stuff. (Another thing was that he somewhat depended on me and it was like he was the only one in the house allowed to be disabled... though ultimately I ended up much more debilitated than he did, and that relationship was a factor in my burning out.) It was also like we were in some kind of sick contest about who was more sick at the time.


Well, saying weird embarrassing things is not narcissism as they are socially good. I dont have much experience with BPD though.I had a female 'girlfriend' who I suspect has asperger's, she said weird stuff at innapropriate times, I thought it was funny and endearing.

orbweaver wrote:
Oh JEEZ. It is like she set that whole thing up.

Im thinking something spiritual was at work because everything fell into place for her to have a hold over me. Financial and things and circumstances did go her way without her planning it. Like people would make choices which just so happened to set her up and disadvantage me. There's no way she could have planned everything.

orbweaver wrote:
My ex tried to convince me that this was the case with *me* and that I craved the attention that casting him as the abuser, got me. Which in retrospect just sounds like abuser logic.

I really can't wrap my mind around somebody enjoying this kind of thing. I am glad that I no longer have to in my personal life.

The thing is with people like this, is that if you even are a conscientious person who has a checkered social history (especially with NTs and narcissists) then you don't want to be an abuser or seen as one, and might be worried that you are and or have a little tickle of doubt there, and that's easy to exploit.


yeah if someone accuses you, then the first few times you stop and pause instead of just instant denial.

orbweaver wrote:
It really doesn't help in my own circumstance that I'm highly alexithymic and it was worse then, I didn't *know* what I was feeling a majority of the time.

It scans to me, that my ex was narcissistic. I know from my experience dealing with other narcissists that basically you just can't call them out on anything, it'll just end up pointed back at you or you'll walk away feeling crazier than you started.


yeah I just shut down and started walking on eggshells before I knew the term...she would actually say she was walking on eggshells. It's this crazy projection thing where they notice something and flip it around.

orbweaver wrote:
I only recently found out about Heartless Asperger's, that might be the one? But there's also FAAAS (Families of Adults Affected By Asperger's Syndrome). Sometimes I wonder if the people complained about actually have Asperger's at all, or if it's something the wife is gaslighting the husband about.


I think it was the heartless one. I would have to go back and read it to make sure.
I just noticed nick007 said a similar thing about it being dodgy.

orbweaver wrote:
It's interesting to me that the problem of NT-ND neurodiverse relationships, seems to be so highly gendered.

Do NT women (or even people with female upbringing in some cases, in the case of my ex) have specific problems interacting with autistic and ADHD people, that NT men have less of? What's going on here?

As someone who identified as/lived as a lesbian for a giant chunk of my adult life (until I got with my present partner) but has had a much harder time interacting with NT women than NT men, it is interesting to me.


it seems like it. with the lady who i suspect has asperger's i found it easier to interact with her than most people.
She said at one point I was the best friend she had ever had. Since then I have met many women but not really clicked with them in the same way.
Hans Asperger described it as 'extreme male brain' so maybe women are looking for more typically female qualities like emotional intelligence etc. from long term partners and friends.



CockneyRebel
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27 Jun 2022, 11:54 pm

I was in two verbally abusive relationships. One when I was in college and one here on WP, many years ago.


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Moloko
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05 Jul 2022, 10:14 am

Here is one resource for domestic violence information and support: https://www.thehotline.org/identify-abuse/

I work in and am highly trained in the field of domestic violence. Domestic violence is about POWER and CONTROL over one's partner. It can be financial, social, emotional, physical, sexual, or other control. It takes many shapes and does not always involve physical abuse. A person who is not hit or otherwise physically abused can still suffer severe negative repercussions from the relationship.

There are studies on autism and abusive relationships, finding that autistic women in particular are hugely vulnerable to domestic violence.

I do have a little concern when the term "narcissistic" is used for abusers. Abusers may be, clinically, a narcissist, or not. They may care a lot for their partner but be terrible at being in a relationship. People learn how to be in relationships with others and they can learn and can choose to be abusive. Abuse does not require a clinical, mental health diagnosis.

The important thing is for survivors of domestic violence to be SAFE and to get support to heal and to avoid abusive relationships in the future. There are many nonprofits that specialize in domestic violence support, including financial support to transition to different housing. Protection orders are available throughout the United States and other places to legally require an abuser to have no contact with the survivor and sometimes their shared children.

Abusers should get help - certified domestic violence treatment, NOT anger management (anger management is proven to make abusers better at getting away with abuse by controlling the most socially unacceptable/illegal behaviors, while still remaining controlling). I saw someone here admit to being the abuser in past relationships, and I really appreciate that willingness to be honest. I have seen abusers transform, and I tell them that they should be motivated to do that because they will have many relationships in their lives and there is a pathway to make those relationships healthy for their partner and themselves.