I suspect my girlfriend may have Aspergers

[confused_boyfriend]

I am a late 30's male and have been dating a woman (mid to late 30's) for just under 6 months. Initially things went great and I fell head over heels in love with her. But, by the time the relationship started to get intimate problems started and were always very difficult to resolve. Eventually she told me she loved me, but certain things didn't make sense. Her actions did not strike me as the actions of a girl in love and it caused tension and further arguments in the relationship, it got to the point where a number of times I threatened to break up with her and I finally did last week. It didn't last long though and she promised me that she would make an effort for the relationship and I've taken her back. Last night I was talking with a friend who suggested that maybe she is somewhere on the spectrum and when I did some research suddenly a lot of things made sense. I love this girl and I guess I am firstly looking to see if I am barking up the wrong tree completely (maybe I'm the one who just doesn't understand her) and if she is on the spectrum how best I can go about making this relationship work. I would be grateful for any advice.

The things that make me think she may be on the spectrum are:

• She is incredibly intelligent. Probably the most intelligent person I've ever met. I'm no dunce, but I've done puzzles where it's taken me a few minutes to solve and I've shown them to her and she's gotten it instantly.
• She is very successful in her career.
• She seems to compartmentalise her life, when she is at work she has no time to do anything else. Messages will get ignored until the evening when she may have her time for answering messages. (She will take phone calls during the day though). When travelling she only has time for what it is she is doing and can not/will not call while she is away.When with family she can not call me as she is with her family, it took her quite a long time to be able to call her mother or answer a text message to someone else when she was with me, but at the same time she will suddenly just start reading newspapers on her phone when we are having a discussion.
• She has almost panic attacks over very minor things (spilling a glass of water) but sometimes misses the importance of larger things.
• She shows a lack of empathy in certain situations
• She seems to enjoy the attention I give her, but apperas to have no desire to reciprocate or do something to make me smile, when I mention it she says it's not true and will then do exactly whatever the example I gave was.
• She has problems with intimacy and although she has had intimacy her knowledge and experience is more equated to someone much younger. She sometimes has almost panic attacks in certain situations when we are intimate.
• In certain social situations where she is used to she is very good, in those where she not so used to she feels awkward. I've seen her being completely rude with a friend just because she was asked what she did for a living.
• She has friends from her childhood, but doesn't open up that much to new friends. She also seems limited in the things that she can talk with her friends about. Superficial relationship stuff is ok, but deeper stuff or anything about intimacy is totally taboo.
• We have had communication problems and certain topics in the relationship were taboo until I made it clear that if we couldn't discuss things there was going to be no relationship.
• I often find her quite cold even though she says she loves me.
• She seems mildy over sensitive to certain stimuli, but not at all to others.
• Sometimes I'm quite surprised at her ability to remember certain pieces of information (car number plates) or details she sees around her or reads, but she often forgets things that I have said.
• She often tells me the same piece of information a number of times.
• She cuts across me when I say something and just starts a completely different conversation topic without letting me finish what I was saying or giving me an answer to what I said.
• Her humour is unnaturally childish for her age. She is embarrassed by any kind of crude joke at all. I've been in a theatre where literally the whole room burst out laughing at a joke and she looked almost uncomfortable.
• She doesn't feel the need to do something to please me in the relationship and when she tries she usually does something for me that is something that would please her. She also shows little interest in me in general (a friend even commented about this once)
• While she had one longer relationship over 10 years ago, since then she's been unable to have anything longer than about 6 months unless the person she was with was emotionally unavailable to her (married or not committing)
• When discussing things she will sometimes rather argue than give me the information I am looking for. Later the informtion will come out and it was no big deal and she has no idea why she made it so difficult for me in the first place.

There have been some minor improvements after we've argued/broken up about things and the last couple of days she really has seemed to be making efforts more towards me and the relationship. Things were really getting me down and getting to the point where my self esteem was really suffering and then my friend suggested it might be Aspergers last night and things started to suddenly make sense.

I would love to make the relationship with this girl work. I do love her, but up until now the fact that I was putting so much in and getting nothing back was getting me really quite low. We were making progress painfully slowly even though she really said she wanted to be with me, but her actions just did not seem to back up what she was saying. I know I can't "fix" this, but I would love to know how I can help her and how I can learn how to deal with this (if it is infact Aspergers) to give this relationship the best chance possible.

I am sorry if I have somehow said something inappropriate. I am facing potentially a new situation and I am feeling quite lost in terms of how best to deal with it. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Nao]

Hello confused_boyfriend. Looking at your list of observations I would think there is a fair chance she is on the spectrum although that is obviously without knowing her background which could also account for some of the behaviours.
My husband was the first person to mention I may have Aspergers but it was easier in our case because our son had already been diagnosed. Maybe you could suggest she tries one of the online tests? I'm not sure how accurate they are but it could be a starting block.

 

[Judge]

I would love to make the relationship with this girl work. I do love her, but up until now the fact that I was putting so much in and getting nothing back was getting me really quite low.

I can only offer this bit of truth in my own case. My relationships with NT women all failed, essentially for the same reason. That neither myself or they had a clue that I might be on the spectrum of autism.

Self-awareness is the key to a possibly better outcome. Of course in approaching her with such a possibility in itself is a risk you must take. Not everyone reacts positively over such a thing. I know in my own case while it peaked my curiosity, that I was also somewhat skeptical about it at first. Had another person in my orbit approached me about being autistic, I'm not sure how I would have reacted to that. It's a complex "voyage of self-discovery". Something best accomplished when someone can rationalize that they themselves may be on the spectrum of autism.

 

[Nao]

I can only offer this bit of truth in my own case. My relationships with NT women all failed, essentially for the same reason. That neither myself or they had a clue that I might be on the spectrum of autism.

Self-awareness is the key to a possibly better outcome. Of course in approaching her with such a possibility in itself is a risk you must take. Not everyone reacts positively over such a thing. I know in my own case while it peaked my curiosity, that I was also somewhat skeptical about it at first. Had another person in my orbit approached me about being autistic, I'm not sure how I would have reacted to that. It's a complex "voyage of self-discovery". Something best accomplished when someone can rationalize that they themselves may be on the spectrum of autism.

My husband and I have been together over twenty years so it can work.

You're definitely right that self awareness is key judge. I read loads when my son was diagnosed but it still didn't occur to me that I too could be on the spectrum until my husband pointed it out. I'm now far more aware of how I can come across and how my actions can make those around me feel. My husband is also more understanding of how I am and less insecure. I think he often felt I didn't care but has come to accept to an extent that I'll never be overly emotional or very able when discussing feelings.
There are also pluses confused_boyfriend in that your girlfriend is unlikely to be clingy or need endless attention.
At least I assume that's a plus but maybe that's more of an ASD perspective!

 

[confused_boyfriend]

Thank you Judge and Jao for your answers.

I know that approaching the subject directly is going to get a firm denial. It is definitely something she won't even enterain. We are talking about a very successful woman who see's her life as completely normal and can't at all figure out why her previous relationships may have failed.

It seems you both feel that she does need to be made aware of it though... May I ask if there was anyway someone could have approached you with this before you were self-aware? Or is there any way I can encourage self awareness?

I'm really sorry if it seems I am clueless here. The relationship has been very challenging and if I didn't care so much I would have given up. I did infact break up lately and she promised me she would make more effort for the relationship and to be fair to her she has. It was after this that I figured out that she may well be on the spectrum and initially it gave me hope that if ther is an explanation for this behaviour then maybe we can learn how to deal with it... But now I realise the only way to deal with it is together and to do that we need to at least find out if she really is on the spectrum or not... and she will need to be open to the possibility for any testing to take place.