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Saccapunta
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13 Dec 2014, 11:00 am

I'm thankful for this community! I've been a long time lurker, but here's my first post. I'm a NT 24yr old female, my ex boyfriend is a 26 yr old with aspergers. First and foremost, I "get him" I have since the beginning, we've been dating for the past five years. Our relationship is beautiful we both love each other unconditionally, we are perfect companions, I'm the only person besides his mother who truly understands him. All in all we have everything a healthy, happy, couple would have. Now, here comes the hairy part and where ASD comes into play, he all of the sudden decided to downgrade our relationship. He wanted to be roommates, because he said he has never felt romance, doesn't know how, and it in turn questioning the five years we have spent together because of that. Now, I'm not going to be his roommate, I can't even stay his friend, I love him too much. I know he lives in a fantasy world and this hasn't truly hit him yet, but I'm left completely confused. This is the man that a few months ago was telling me I was the best thing to ever happen in his life, is living together has drastically increased the quality of his life. He was planning to propose last year. We are both on the same page, he is saying the same things that I am saying to mutual friends "our relationship is beautiful, we are best friends and love each other unconditionally, except he's caught up on this one little detail :cry: I'm not expecting the community to solve the problems, but maybe someone can shed some light on this situation to better help me understand what is going on in his mind. Thank you all for your help.



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13 Dec 2014, 11:58 am

It's taken him five years of being with you to experience and analyze the situation, and then reach a conclusion all on his own.

Now you want us - strangers that have never met you or your boyfriend - to explain what is going on and provide a solution for you.

[opinion=mine]

The person you need to discuss this with is your boyfriend. If you've spent five years with someone and still have no idea what motivates him or how he makes decisions, then you have not really been in love with him. Instead, you have been infatuated with the idea of being in a romantic relationship.

At this point, your options are limited. First, you could confront him and demand that he fall in love with you. Second, you could just accept the fact that you are involved in a relationship wherein the other person is simply no longer interested in you and let it devolve into platonic mode. Finally, you could simply pack up and move on, and consider the last five years as a learning experience.

[/opinion]

Keep in mind that I am not a relationship counselor, that I can not read your minds, and that I have only your accounting of things from which to make a judgment.

Good luck.


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Saccapunta
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13 Dec 2014, 12:05 pm

Thank you for your post, but that is not what I'm asking. He has never learned the emotion of romance and now he is over analyzing the situation. I'm not asking for someone to solve the problem, just simply some insight on the asd brain, maybe someone has experienced similar circumstances.



Fnord
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13 Dec 2014, 12:12 pm

My personal experience is that when an Aspie/NT relationship goes bad, the Aspie gets all the blame from the NT, while the NT will never even consider that he or she could in any way be even partially to blame.


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Saccapunta
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13 Dec 2014, 12:24 pm

Well, considering he has point blank said "this is me, not you" I'm guessing he's on the blaming end, but I'm not here to blame, I'm here to see if any one has insight/helpful words for this situation. I'm not spiteful, I'm not angry, I can give him his space. I'm just hurt and confused. I know he lives in a fantasy world, and I also know he has no idea of the repercussions of this decision. I love him so much, I want the best for both of us, even if that means parting ways. Again, I'm just fundamentally confused by this. Especially since we have a loving wonderful relationship (and that's not just my end, he is saying the same thing)



rdos
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13 Dec 2014, 1:10 pm

Saccapunta wrote:
He has never learned the emotion of romance and now he is over analyzing the situation.


That's not something you learn. The typical problem instead is that neurodiverse (and ASD) people can't figure out which phase they are in. Typical dating creates even more confusing because it is not the natural way many neurodiverse people would form relationships. In fact, many neurodiverse people makes little difference between friend and partner. So while I'm sure he has many feelings towards you, he might not be able figure out if you are his friend, girlfriend or whatever. That doesn't mean he doesn't have or understand his emotions. You might be able to help him here by explaining what you mean by "friend", "girlfriend" and "dating".

Another factor here could be that as I go from a crush to a relationship, the obsessive part decreases considerably, as does the priorities. People might confuse this shift with losing interest when it is just a new phase. While I don't need any feedback at all when I have a crush, I need regular hugs in the relationship phase.



timtowdi
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13 Dec 2014, 3:36 pm

Fnord wrote:
It's taken him five years of being with you to experience and analyze the situation, and then reach a conclusion all on his own.

Now you want us - strangers that have never met you or your boyfriend - to explain what is going on and provide a solution for you.

[opinion=mine]

The person you need to discuss this with is your boyfriend. If you've spent five years with someone and still have no idea what motivates him or how he makes decisions, then you have not really been in love with him. Instead, you have been infatuated with the idea of being in a romantic relationship.

At this point, your options are limited. First, you could confront him and demand that he fall in love with you. Second, you could just accept the fact that you are involved in a relationship wherein the other person is simply no longer interested in you and let it devolve into platonic mode. Finally, you could simply pack up and move on, and consider the last five years as a learning experience.

[/opinion]

Keep in mind that I am not a relationship counselor, that I can not read your minds, and that I have only your accounting of things from which to make a judgment.

Good luck.



This seems unnecessarily harsh, even jerky. This person has arrived here in pain, entirely reasonably, and the reaction is not only to be irritated, but to feel it necessary to express the irritation at this woman?

OP: Please ignore this guy. He's very rude.



timtowdi
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13 Dec 2014, 3:48 pm

Saccapunta: I've got only a very limited view, so this is the best I can offer --

It's possible that after all this time he has, like a lot of people you'll hear on this board, started questioning whether what he feels is really love. And trying like the devil to get at the definition of love and finding he doesn't understand what it's supposed to mean, because he's massively overthinking it. So he becomes convinced that whatever it is, he doesn't understand and doesn't feel it, and if he doesn't feel it he shouldn't be in a relationship where he's supposed to feel it and say that he feels it and somebody's going to get mad at him if he doesn't.

As rdos says, he may also be fundamentally confusing "massive crush" and "love", and since he doesn't feel the way he did three, four, five years ago, he may have decided that this means he doesn't love you, because he isn't sure, and surely if he loved you he'd know, right? Like it would just announce itself in some big and readily-identifiable emotion.

It's very unlikely you're going to persuade him that he's being an idiot, which he likely is, but he's also not going to be loose about it and say "whatever, I have the best time of my life with you, carry on" like anybody else would. The other thing to be concerned about here is the completely unilateral nature of what he's doing: out of the blue, a major life change for not just him but for you, and he sounds pretty blithe about it.

However things go with him, you need to think about whether this is something you can handle periodically in a marriage, especially if you're planning to have a family. In other words, I'm suggesting that even though the impulse is to deal with the emergency and try to understand what's happening, you also take a step back and look at the situation he's suddenly created, and ask yourself whether this sort of thing looks promising for you and your future.



Paukipaul
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13 Dec 2014, 4:12 pm

I don't get it. Where is the problem?

Is being roommates a bad thing? Could somebody explain the situation to me please?



androbot01
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13 Dec 2014, 4:32 pm

So is roommate being used as a euphemism for not having sex anymore? If so, I think you have been dumped. Living with someone you've had a couple relationship with is awkward at best. I'd make new living arrangements.



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13 Dec 2014, 4:37 pm

Paukipaul wrote:
I don't get it. Where is the problem? Is being roommates a bad thing? Could somebody explain the situation to me please?
The problem: A relationship has changed, and someone who once thought that she understood her partner is now at a loss to understand why it happened, so she is seeking insight from strangers on a social website instead of trying to work it out with her partner.

No, being roommates is not a bad thing; but when the decision is unilaterally made to downgrade a relationship, it often leads one of the partners feeling at a loss to understand why.

Sometimes, it all comes down to one partner losing interest in the other partner, no more and no less.


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kraftiekortie
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13 Dec 2014, 4:46 pm

I feel bad that you're going through this. Even if Aspie, there's no excuse for one to be insensitive. I know you love him, and probably see this as a challenge. Also, you just don't want to split after five years; that's difficult for anybody to do.

However, in this case, I'd stop being blatant about your love for him, and feign indifference. He just might change his mind because now HE has a challenge on his hands.

I just wouldn't tolerate the state you are in now. I'd make changes.



Paukipaul
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13 Dec 2014, 5:02 pm

Is "being Roommates" like you "you are like a sister to me" or something like that? Like, that means no relationship stuff takes place anymore?



timtowdi
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13 Dec 2014, 5:12 pm

Why would she play games like that, kraftiekortie? It doesn't sound healthy.

Fnord continues rude, for no reason, against someone who has never done him any harm.

Paukipaul: It's a serious thing to say that you no longer love someone, or that you had only pretended to love someone. If "I never really loved you" is meant seriously, it means that the other person then has no idea what the time with you has meant or whether it's been a fraud, whether she's been deceived into putting time and love into the relationship. She will feel deeply hurt and cruelly used. It also means that if you come back and say, no, I didn't mean that, I do love you, she will always have cause to doubt your love on some level.

Loving is a relational thing. It's not just about one person feeling a thing in isolation.



rdos
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13 Dec 2014, 5:22 pm

androbot01 wrote:
So is roommate being used as a euphemism for not having sex anymore? If so, I think you have been dumped. Living with someone you've had a couple relationship with is awkward at best. I'd make new living arrangements.


I didn't think in such terms, but that could be a factor. We could have a case of and Aspie that no longer feel he wants to have sex with his partner. That's a whole different thing from not loving her anymore, but to an NT it could be the same thing.

If this is the problem, I think the problem mainly is with her, and not with him. If he is kind of on the asexual side, and only had sex with her before because she required it, then there is no fix other than her accepting the state of it or leaving him. He can't fake wanting sex forever.



EmeraldGreen
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13 Dec 2014, 5:26 pm

Corny, but true:

If you love something, set it free. If it comes back, it's yours. If it doesn't, it never was.


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