Intimacy/Male Partner

Asperger's Syndrome
#1

Can anyone HELP. My partner of 3.5 years has AS. At first I wondered if it was me and he just did not care or love me. Through time I have realized it is the AS and I just do not know how to cope with lack of intimacy, time, touch, caring. He does not seem to even notice me unless he feels that I am about to leave him. Which I did for 4 months last year. I feel lonly, there is not even sexual intimacy. Though I know he has sexual feelings, it is just there not for me I know he finds other women attractive. We do not do anything together except meals and watching DVD’s. Does not have any friends or family near by. He loves the computer and that is were he spends his nights whole weekend or playing with electronics. I have been depressed over this for sometime, and I have even gained 10 lbs now. I am going to start at the gym today and continue to go. I know I will feel better and start to look better. I know I can not let myself go just because of this anylonger.

I do love him and there are some tender times and talks that keep me here. I know he suffers too. It is hard when you see other couples together sharing time and activities together.

Marie

#2

As a man with AS, it sounds like he also suffers from depression. This may be compounded by his AS, which makes things more complicated.

I’m no psychologist, so you may take the following with a grain of salt, but there are two ways a relationship with an AS partner can go sour. One is that he tries to have a relationship, but the AS creates severe communications problems. The other is that he gives up and doesn’t even try. In the first case, you need to learn to deal with his AS, but in the second, you may first need to deal with his depression.

Depression is common with AS.

#3

Dear Marie,

I am a married male (7 years) with AS (diagnosed ~.

Changing my diet saved my marriage. I used to be withdrawn, irritable and paranoid but altering my diet helped me to be much more functional.

I am chemical and food intolerant. Different food and chemical combinations can cause withdrawal from everyone and everything (feels like being inside a grey cloud and you can’t think straight), severe anxiety, depression, obsessive compulsive symptoms, skin rashes, dark rings under the eyes, severe upset tummy or constipation etc. All of these can be improved by dietary changes.

Ginkgo biloba and magnesium sulfate baths may also help:

http://www.enzymestuff.com/epsomsalts.htm

Ginkgo really helps me with my asd symptoms. I take “natures own” 2000mg three times a day 9am, 3pm amd 8pm. Makes a very big difference to my brain functioning level.

http://www.naturesown.com.au/prod_details.php?ID=0756

You may need to be very specific on what you do want with your husband. He may not know when the right time is to be intimate with you. You may need to help him initally so that he knows what type of things to do. Hopefully if you can get your husband to try the food changes then he will be able to think more clearly and will be more like the person you only see rarely now. If your husband is willing to try anything to be better then this is definately worth trying! I know that I have changed so much since I made these changes (for the better) which is why I want to help other people.

Have a look at these sites and get back to me if you have any questions.

I have also had great success with magnesium sulfate baths (epsom salts).

http://www.enzymestuff.com/epsomsalts.htm

http://www.epsomsaltcouncil.org/articles/Report_on_Absorption_of_magnesium_sulfate.pdf

http://www.epsomsaltcouncil.org/articles/Sulfation_Benefits_072204.pdf

Also with dietary changes and minimising exposure to volatile chemicals and chemical exposure in general.

http://www.fedupwithfoodadditives.info/

Scroll down page for factsheets (yellow)

http://www.fedupwithfoodadditives.info/factsheets/Factautism.htm

http://www.fedupwithfoodadditives.info/factsheets/Factdairy.htm

http://www.immuneweb.org/articles/slimak.html

http://www.autism.com/

http://www.autism.com/treatable/index.htm

http://www.fedupwithfoodadditives.info/factsheets/Factdairy.htm

My sympathies and best of luck.

Kingfan

#4

Marie, this may sound bad, but if you have been together for 3.5 years, I
wonder how often you may be intimate. I don’t think I would be able to
stick around, however, if you were to break it off with him, he may not be
as hurt as you would be. You could still be friends perhaps, but unless you
are honest about your need for intimacy with him, you won’t ever have a
chance at being happy with him. Perhaps your relationship is more of a
caring for one another, in a sincere way, yet the intimacy isn’t there.
From what I know and have seen with aspergers, and from my own personal
relationships with men (I had dated a lot before I got married), I would
feel exactly as you do. You need to keep looking. Believe me, your partner
will be able to go on. You may have a more difficult time, however, but you
will find someone who can share your desire of intimacy.

FYI: I have a 11 year old son with Aspergers who was in foster care for
almost a year, away from me. He left his foster care mom (who was wonderful
with him), and has not even talked about visiting her or anything, which
makes me think that he is able to live with or without knowing what she is
up to. I have seen him get very emotional over things, such as his mice,
cat, or dog more so than if something happens to his brother (i.e. fell on
his bicycle and got hurt badly), or his grandfather being diagnosed with
cancer, for instance. I hope this helps.

From: Marie aspergers-cpt6327@lists.careplace.com
Reply-To: Marie aspergers-cpt6327@lists.careplace.com
To: shecroy@msn.com
Subject: [aspergers] Intimacy/Male Partner
Date: Mon, 15 Oct 2007 10:42:13 -0400

#5

Dear Marie, I think I know just what you are feeling. I have been with
my partner for the last eight years - he’s a lovely, intelligent fellow,
but very strange emotionally. Recently we’ve been having a lot of
conflict because of his temper tantrums that include this absolutely
crazy screaming at me. The relationship is on the rocks pretty much, and
he is dealing with it by burying his head in his maths studies. This is
what he does mostly - study mathematics and resentfully goes off to work
now as a teacher. When he comes home, he studies maths some more, and
then before he goes to work in the morning he studies maths, maths and
more maths. I swear if I was a maths symbol I’d get some attention,
however, I’m just a lowly woman and therefore seem to be quite
uninteresting. This is so boring… love or no love, Marie, you and me
both deserve more. Just trust your feelings about what makes you
happy…and don’t accept this substandard treatment. I know you probably
think that this is some kind of moral issue - your guy can’t help what
he is and he does probably have some notion of love for you - but the
issue is, can he make you happy. It doesn’t matter what his internal
feelings for you are if those feelings can’t get translated into
something that you can live on emotionally. You are being emotionally
starved, and my guess is that this is why you are over feeding yourself.
My wish for you is as it is for myself - trust yourself, believe in what
you are feeling, and act in your best interest. Life is too short for
self-inflicted pain. Wish you well Marie, C.

#6

Thanks for your reply. You’re right about the depression - but its not
very easily dealt with. If my partner is unable to progress with his
mathematics studies, which means generally sitting down all day and
night till bedtime, he feels as if he is wasting his time. His academic
career failed in a big way some years ago and he has not really adjusted
to the practical world which requires him to balance his personal
interests with work. He becomes depressed I believe mostly because he is
very single-focused and does not cope with doing more than one thing in
his life. Moreover, he has tried very hard to overcome some of the
practical obstacles without success, and the energy that it has taken
him to do this has caused him to sink even lower. I understand him quite
well I believe, but that has not stopped me from feeling emotionally
neglected, a very diminished experience of companionship, and resentful
over the lack of reciprocity generally - it is a relationship that could
be described as lacking a balance between give and take. To top it off,
when I try to talk to him about these problems, he tells me that he does
not agree with the notion of democratic relationships based on mutual
satisfaction. Instead, he has a preference for objectively discernible
values which both parties submit to. As you can see, it is quite a
tangled web of emotional mismatching and conceptual wars based on the
mismatch. I’m thinking about ending it. But thanks for taking the time
to write your thoughts to me - very much appreciated. C

#7

I am curious as to why you all married these men in the first place? What
was the attraction and why did it change? And I really don’t get why someone
would cancel someones charge cards without telling them beforehand ~ sounds
a bit bizarre to me.

----- Original Message -----
From: “carmella” aspergers-cpt6327@lists.careplace.com
To: peardon@oakharbor.net
Sent: Sunday, November 04, 2007 7:10 PM
Subject: Re: [aspergers] Intimacy/Male Partner