I'm still not 100% I'll be very active here, nor that I'll stay but I'm looking for more help than I've gotten through some Aspie Wives groups.
My husband hasn't been officially diagnosed with AS but we were in marriage counseling for several months when it came up and our counselor feels this is a viable thing for my husband. However, my husband refuses to acknowledge this, at all.
I've been married for more than 20 years to my husband and through it all, he's had us bouncing from one crisis to the next. He was raised in an alcoholic household (as was I, but three years of counseling taught me to separate that and the issues that go with it from my life, for the most part) and lives in crisis mode, pretty much all the time. Throughout our life together, and it's been hard, he's been DX'd with a number of emotional issues that I believe are related to his having AS. I've always been supportive of him because he can't help being what he is. I've also been asked over the years why I've not left him? He's ill, pure and simple. When you marry, it's for better AND worse. I loved him when I married him and it wasn't until kids started coming along the problems started. During more than one rant on his part, he's screamed at me how much he didn't want kids but agreed to it to "make you happy".
My greatest frustration with him is: He truly believes he's the greatest husband in the world and blames a great deal on me. For instance: When my dad was sick and dying from cancer, I was taking care of my parents and three kids, plus working full-time (which I changed to part-time to have more time for the family). When my dad died, I was alone in dealing with that. Turns out, while I was going through the losing, then loss, of a parent to cancer, my husband was in the midst of an affair with someone he worked with. The affair, I found out later, was going on pretty much the entire time my dad was sick and didn't end until a couple months after my dad died. When it all came to light, due to the other person's husband calling our house, my husband's excuse for the affair was, "You weren't paying enough attention to me". Terribly sorry, darling, that my father's dying got in the way of me paying more attention to you.
There have been other times in my life where I've needed to be supported, such as major surgery, and my husband was "somewhere else", only to learn later he was in the midst of another affair. It seems my husband simply can't stand my attention being drawn anywhere but him. He resents my wanting/needing to have anyone but him in my life, even my extended family.
To be honest, I probably should have left him a long time ago but I was raising kids and didn't want to put them through not just a divorce but the loss of their father. Where that comes from is: I am the second wife and second family for him. When he and his first wife divorced, he didn't pursue a relationship with the kids from that marriage, going six years w/o seeing either of them, until the oldest turned 18 and called ME about coming to visit. I knew, were we to divorce, the kids would never see him again and it would cause tremendous problems down the road, as it's now doing with my step-kids, both in their 30's. Our kids, now grown and moving on, are starting to realize the effects of an absentee father, even when he was in the room. There was simply no engagement or interest in anyone's life on his part. Though it's now explained as Asperger's, it doesn't take away the anger and hurt of being neglected, abused, lied to, cheated on and ignored for over two decades. With the diagnosis, we're all required, now, to shrug everything off and make things all better again.
I'm frustrated. I try to support my husband but the more I learn, the more I think there's no "fixing" this, even through therapy and awareness. My husband simply wants to go on being the Aspie and require me to be the only one to do any adjusting. I've heard from him so many times since his unofficial DX, "I can't help it. I have Asperger's". For a long time, when my husband's emotional problems were just "mental" (and I use quotes to signify I am using not exactly the best term but it's the best I can come up with for now) he was always searching for the quick fix, give him a pill and let him go on; he's never really been actively involved in any kind of therapy that didn't involve blaming me 100% for everything. The minute a counselor would begin to hint he also needed to do some changing, he was out the door, never to darken it again.
When my husband is an active part of the marriage, he's wonderful. When he's not, I'm left in the wake of his latest, "I need to impress my wife and make her stay" episode, wondering what happened to the man I just saw yesterday? Sadly, the good times are fewer and further between, now, as he took his DX as a reason to continue ignoring me, etc. with a shrug and a, "I can't help it. You just have to accept it". I've done a great deal of reading on AS in the hopes of bringing more to the table that is our marriage counseling. I'd like to work with his AS and change my expectations, but I need him to work towards working with his AS and consciously recognize how difficult it is for me, being married to him, and working towards positive change. It's hard to save a marriage when only one of us is invested in it enough to work towards positive change.
I realize this is a long "Introduce Yourself" post but I'm trying to help the rest of you understand my starting point here. I'm angry, I'm hurt, I'm abused (yes, that's gone on, too), I've been lied to, I've been cheated on and I'm still here, operating under the belief he's done all these things because of AS. I don't know, maybe it IS time to move on, but this is my last ditch effort to save a marriage of nearly 3 decades.
My husband hasn't been officially diagnosed with AS but we were in marriage counseling for several months when it came up and our counselor feels this is a viable thing for my husband. However, my husband refuses to acknowledge this, at all.
I've been married for more than 20 years to my husband and through it all, he's had us bouncing from one crisis to the next. He was raised in an alcoholic household (as was I, but three years of counseling taught me to separate that and the issues that go with it from my life, for the most part) and lives in crisis mode, pretty much all the time. Throughout our life together, and it's been hard, he's been DX'd with a number of emotional issues that I believe are related to his having AS. I've always been supportive of him because he can't help being what he is. I've also been asked over the years why I've not left him? He's ill, pure and simple. When you marry, it's for better AND worse. I loved him when I married him and it wasn't until kids started coming along the problems started. During more than one rant on his part, he's screamed at me how much he didn't want kids but agreed to it to "make you happy".
My greatest frustration with him is: He truly believes he's the greatest husband in the world and blames a great deal on me. For instance: When my dad was sick and dying from cancer, I was taking care of my parents and three kids, plus working full-time (which I changed to part-time to have more time for the family). When my dad died, I was alone in dealing with that. Turns out, while I was going through the losing, then loss, of a parent to cancer, my husband was in the midst of an affair with someone he worked with. The affair, I found out later, was going on pretty much the entire time my dad was sick and didn't end until a couple months after my dad died. When it all came to light, due to the other person's husband calling our house, my husband's excuse for the affair was, "You weren't paying enough attention to me". Terribly sorry, darling, that my father's dying got in the way of me paying more attention to you.
There have been other times in my life where I've needed to be supported, such as major surgery, and my husband was "somewhere else", only to learn later he was in the midst of another affair. It seems my husband simply can't stand my attention being drawn anywhere but him. He resents my wanting/needing to have anyone but him in my life, even my extended family.
To be honest, I probably should have left him a long time ago but I was raising kids and didn't want to put them through not just a divorce but the loss of their father. Where that comes from is: I am the second wife and second family for him. When he and his first wife divorced, he didn't pursue a relationship with the kids from that marriage, going six years w/o seeing either of them, until the oldest turned 18 and called ME about coming to visit. I knew, were we to divorce, the kids would never see him again and it would cause tremendous problems down the road, as it's now doing with my step-kids, both in their 30's. Our kids, now grown and moving on, are starting to realize the effects of an absentee father, even when he was in the room. There was simply no engagement or interest in anyone's life on his part. Though it's now explained as Asperger's, it doesn't take away the anger and hurt of being neglected, abused, lied to, cheated on and ignored for over two decades. With the diagnosis, we're all required, now, to shrug everything off and make things all better again.
I'm frustrated. I try to support my husband but the more I learn, the more I think there's no "fixing" this, even through therapy and awareness. My husband simply wants to go on being the Aspie and require me to be the only one to do any adjusting. I've heard from him so many times since his unofficial DX, "I can't help it. I have Asperger's". For a long time, when my husband's emotional problems were just "mental" (and I use quotes to signify I am using not exactly the best term but it's the best I can come up with for now) he was always searching for the quick fix, give him a pill and let him go on; he's never really been actively involved in any kind of therapy that didn't involve blaming me 100% for everything. The minute a counselor would begin to hint he also needed to do some changing, he was out the door, never to darken it again.
When my husband is an active part of the marriage, he's wonderful. When he's not, I'm left in the wake of his latest, "I need to impress my wife and make her stay" episode, wondering what happened to the man I just saw yesterday? Sadly, the good times are fewer and further between, now, as he took his DX as a reason to continue ignoring me, etc. with a shrug and a, "I can't help it. You just have to accept it". I've done a great deal of reading on AS in the hopes of bringing more to the table that is our marriage counseling. I'd like to work with his AS and change my expectations, but I need him to work towards working with his AS and consciously recognize how difficult it is for me, being married to him, and working towards positive change. It's hard to save a marriage when only one of us is invested in it enough to work towards positive change.
I realize this is a long "Introduce Yourself" post but I'm trying to help the rest of you understand my starting point here. I'm angry, I'm hurt, I'm abused (yes, that's gone on, too), I've been lied to, I've been cheated on and I'm still here, operating under the belief he's done all these things because of AS. I don't know, maybe it IS time to move on, but this is my last ditch effort to save a marriage of nearly 3 decades.
