Aspies For Freedom

There was a time and place when I wish I could have had a second chance.  

Time: late June 1997
My location: Martinsburg WV
Hers: somewhere between Frederick and Baltimore MD
gf time order: first
neurological status: cousin/bipolar
Proposal: immediately initiated on request

I wanted every bit as much then as I do now to be somebody's excellent husband.   So when she forced the issue of proposing marriage over the phone (a little like Fiona in the first Shrek, temper) I caved in, I had not yet learned to say no to a woman.  
Later I reflected on it and figured it was going to be a mistake for the both of us, perhaps less harmful the sooner we changed course.  She was having none of that.  I believe her self-esteem and peer standing was very dependent on getting married, and besides, women almost never admit to strong sexual feelings to anyone but their guys, and she had hers too.  

Choice 1.  Marry (my educated guess, within 6 to 12 months)
Choice 2.  Disappear.

I could have used a third option.

Choice 3.  Temporarily retreat, re-engage (literally) after my employment and knowing considerably more about her.  I reckon I was easy to know, perhaps she was not an open person.

Legacy.  We talked for the last time after September 11th.  She had also written that I had been an excellent friend (note past tense, probably an apology and farewell).  I never did get any further address or telephone information for her.

Legacy (con't): her very strenuous statement that I would get a girlfriend intrigues me.  She is bipolar, a cousin, at that time I was a confirmed Aspergian after a year of Prozac therapy for depression (and having finished treatment for male reproductive cancer).  

It adds more gasoline to the burning question of, what do cousins and Aspergians see that NTs do not see?  

And yes, I did learn how to say no to a woman.

Time: November-December 2005
My location: Alexandria VA.
Hers: Woodbridge VA.
gf time order: third
neurological status: also cousin/bipolar
Proposal: rejected after a month of consideration, appeal was heard and relationship temporarily continued, but was rejected again and in writing last February

The tale of two white Christian girls with bipolar, huh?

Morale: I am sure you won't, but don't force him to make one of two choices.  Accept some of the share of responsibility for a mistake such as a proposal.  I'm sure you won't, but don't introduce your standing among peers or personal reasons as additional reasons for the relationship.

For my part, I am doing my best to put these feelings in their proper places:
1.  loneliness of having no intimate relationship, and never having had a sexual one
2.  feeling invisible.  We can probably be forgiven for thinking women don't see us, if we can't read their signals.
3.  feeling inferior.  As Wikipedia indicated, so-called nerds (correlated with Asperger syndrome) (which would seem to apply to me because of intense disparate educational abilities and interests and a confirmed social challenge) are not only depicted in popular culture as dreaming of women they "can't get", but also if they are obnoxiously pursuing one, a common punch line is to take him down a peg.  Can you believe that is comedy?

before I was fully aware of the popular culture issue, it was difficult to work with extroverted women, and every company has them.  We always have the staff who meet with our clients and who arrange conferences in addition to more traditional services such as policy evaluation research, Web design and related technical projects like databases and CDs, and military weapons engineering (we have supported AEGIS and Phalanx, mostly Navy customers) and rocket launches.  

The truth does set you free, pretty much.  

The individuals involved were not the problem.  We know how to work without acknowledging wrongful feelings (and even positive feelings are not right in an organization) and we do.  It was the culture that was bothering me.  Popular culture tells me and tells potential mates that I should not be approached for a relationship.  Our culture also leads a lot of Aspergians to suicide and a lot of expectant parents who even know the slightest risk of autism in their fetus and want to mercy kill it to prevent it from hurting in our culture.

The culture is the enemy.  





Just in case, I wrote her last February and indicated that not only were her interests and mine generally incompatible, but that I recognized the severity of her disability and told her that in practice marriages in the general region have two incomes and are generally adults matched on intelligence, education and occupational status if not income.

Hanging On, why do you think he has Asperger's?  I didn't see it in what you wrote.

Harsh opinion: he does not foresee the relationship enduring and he can't stand your over-the-top emotionality and desperation.

Get into therapy NOW so you'll have that support when the relationship ends. Your "I can't live without him" feelings are not healthy -- masochistic, histrionic and futile. Therapy NOW.

Word to Max.

No offense Hanging On but you sound like one of those control-freak hussies that want complete domination over their lover's lives. LOL get some therapy now. Before you end up destroying his life.

BTW I would ask of you to use the bloody shift key and use paragraphs. kthxbai.

<<

Yes, additional support to Max!
And way to go Hyke, I didn't  think of it this way till now!

And I wish my first gf had come to your realization too

My take, fwiw, is that he set some boundaries (I want to focus on my son while I'm visiting) and you transgressed them.  So now he's probably angry and fearful--angry that you couldn't respect his request and fearful that you will continue to overwhelm him with your needs for connection.

For the relationship to work, you're probably going to have to give him more space.  How much more?  I dunno. If you back off sufficiently, he may come back to you, because he'd feel like it was his free choice, not an obligation.  You might have made him feel emotionally trapped, which brought up fears of "I cannot deliver what she needs" and anger "I don't want to deliver what she needs."

Good luck.

HangingOn, please check the PM I sent you.

Hyke has hit on something here.  Personally, I freak out a bit when people don't act as I expect and I take a while to rebuild my model of "what this is person is like" to incorporate the new information.  Your bf's reaction could be like this, and given time, he may calm down and be able to accept that part of you.

I'd like to admonish the people here who have been cruel to HangingOn (BardWolf in particular).  I am in a very similar situation, with very similar feelings going on- and beleive me when I say being called an "overcontroling hussie" doesn't fix ANYTHING.  Not everyone who comes across that way is making a choice to be that way, you know.  It's very hard to deal with these feelings of overattatchment and it causes at least as much distress in the person being "overcontroling" as it does in their SO.  As max said, though, it's very important to get treatment for this.  It's OK to love your bf very deeply, but when it gets to the point that it is hurting both of you, you need to seek outside help.

HangingOn, you should tell your bf that you've come to understand him and yourself better, that you are willing to make chanes in your life and know what changes you need to make.  Show him what you are doing to fix what's wrong.  If he is so inclined, he'll see what you're doing, be respectful of that, and maybe give it a second go.
Good luck.

Hanging On you tell us that you are mature yet you happily post some very immature responses to your boyfriend. You tell us he has Asperger's traits and don't show us any. You say "if he has AS, he might just walk off one day when he's had  enough of me". Is this what AS men do? Which ones? Under what circumstances and why?
You also have basically admitted that you really "blew it" and acted very, very badly around him and are concerned now that he may not trust your reactions. I am not at all surprised.
You are going on and telling us that you can't live without him and so on.
What exactly are you after?
Do you want us to "grow you up"?
Do you want us to wind back the clock?
Do you want us to give you a proper understanding of what autism is?
Do you want empathy, sympathy or compassion?
Do you need us to give you listing to psychologists or mental health services in you area?
What exactly are you after? What do you need? I understand you are upset and it is difficult for you but what do you need from us? I am willing to do my best to help but I am not sure what you are after and I really don't know what you are after.

Accusing the OP of immaturity is completely unnecessary, especially in a forum where many if not most of the members have had the problem of being "slow to mature" by the very nature of AS itself.

Interpersonal delay is certainly an area of difficulty for many of us, as you can see some of us have trouble understanding the needs of emotional intimacy at a much later age than what the OP claims to be (25.)

Sometimes when I see other people being accused of immaturity, I get offended myself, and in this case I did.  Thought I'd stick up for someone being thrashed around, here.

I'm still going go with my previous statement. << Mmkay

I think wanting texts every hour was a bit much. Then again, I'm an Aspie woman and don't tend to worry too much about that. Unfortunately, I've also been in the position of having impossible and intense crushes on some guys and it's really hard to get back onto an even keel.

This relationship doesn't sound all that healthy but I wonder how much therapy is really going to help. All too frequently, therapy is held up as something that will work miracles and "fix" everything up. It's expensive (unless you can get community funded counselling) and unless you can build up a rapport with the therapist (and believe me, I've come across some who are more messed up than me) it doesn't do much good.

I wish I could suggest something more positive but the main thing I think of (hard though it is) is to back right off.

I don't understand why he suddenly put the restriction on contacting him when he was with his son but if he is Aspie, he probably finds it too confusing trying to communicate with more than one person at a time. I know I do.

overy emotion isnt horrible nor is AS your just comimng from oposite sides of the river, and its time to build a brige.

I'm both over-emotional and AS, as it is, and it can be a pretty rough combination to live with.

I like your wit! lol

nice.