Cassandra’s ugly sister

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I bumped into another site dedicated to that “Cassandra” argument.

I know that we have already discussed it here in “Cassandra Affective Disorder.”
http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt24081.html

To all the accusations I hear in this argument, I can say, "not guilty." The real trouble is my husband's intolerance and HIS refusal to consider any point of view but his own.

I most certainly do have an "interior life." It's just one that he can not grasp and he makes no effort. I most certainly do have a "theory of mind," and my capacity for "empathy" is world class, thank you. It's just difficult for me to wrap my mind around all the self-serving logic, the lies, the power games, the mind-boggling Matrix of social fictions that are causing all of the world's troubles. We are not a disease. We are the cure. The bottom line is about a lack of tolerance and empathy, and in this area, NTs are uniformly more guilty than Aspies. We spend our entire lives trying to figure out how to translate, while the world makes no effort and flatly denies that we exist.

It’s not about who has what disorder. It’s about tolerance and a refusal to try, and it’s about equality vs power. Either side can be guilty.

My capacity for empathy allows me to fully understand that he wants to be the perennial predator, at my expense. Poor dear. I suppose that if I really cared about him, I would just lie down and allow him to continue to feed, forever.

Last edited by Tahitiii on 27 Mar 2009, 11:02 am, edited 1 time in total.

You really do need a partnership. Equality. It doesn’t work to just shut up and take it while one person wins all the time. I let too much stuff go for too long. A big factor is how much I hate drama. I should know by now that drama and standing up for yourself is sometimes a necessary evil, but I'll do just about anything to avoid it.

I wasn't a child. I was already divorced when we met. We dated for four years and were married for four years, and I was almost 35 when the first kid was born. I knew who I was and I figured I was strong enough, that all the dominant-male crap wouldn't get to me. Do you need an ego boost? Here, open this jar. I was a self-sufficient grown up before he came along, and continued to be one for those first eight years. I figured I could afford it.

When I was pregnant (twice, three years apart) I felt that letting him be protective was right. A lot of that stereotypical behavior may be cultural, but I really believe that a lot of it is natural, especially when you're pregnant and, to a lesser extent, when you have small children. Taking a little time-out to be a mommy made sense to me. Why should I have to worry about protecting myself FROM him when he should be the one protecting ME from the big, bad world? So I started letting things slide. My self-esteem was fine at the time because I knew who I was and that I was doing the right things. Let him be the big man if it makes him feel better.

The trouble is, it didn’t end when the baby started kindergarten. Little by little, he took stuff away, by force or by fraud. Some jobs I stink at and/or hate, and the slightest criticism just kills what little motivation I can muster. You think you’re such a great cook? Fine, the kitchen is yours. For the jobs I'm good at and/or enjoy, I can easily ignore the criticism because it's so obviously false. Either way, I didn’t put up much of a fuss.

Like tax returns: there’s nothing unusual about our situation. A mortgage, a couple of kids, a couple of W2 forms. No self-employment or unusual wheeling and dealing. What kind of an idiot can’t fill out a simple tax return? But one day, after years of doing it myself with no problem, he decided that we needed to pay someone to do it. No reason. It just made him feel better to do what everyone else seems to be doing.

The temper tantrums started slow and got crazier and crazier over the years. Sometimes I’d stand and fight, and I always lost because I don’t know how to answer something that makes no sense. Mostly I would just walk away. I started naming his stupid demons. Jack, Groucho, Hercules, Ken… I’ve had a thousand theories/excuses for him over the years. Childhood trauma, chemical imbalance, borderline personality… No one little argument impressed me because they were really stupid. But all together – it’s as though he had dedicated his life to convincing me that I was worthless. It didn’t work on me directly because it wasn’t true, but he managed to convince himself. That part eventually got to me. Just the fact that HE believed it, and that he needed so desperately for me to believe that I was worthless.

I’ve been struggling with on-and-off employment for the past nine years. With my spotty resume and weak interviews, they won’t let me back into the real work force, and I can’t handle s**t jobs. More important than the low pay or the low social status, a s**t job has no intrinsic rewards and they treat you like a dog. I can’t handle the abuse, I shut down, and it makes me so stupid that I can’t figure out the simplest things.

And it’s not like I can go home and recharge. I fed his stupid ego all those years, while he did nothing but try to tear mine down.

Then we were both unemployed for a couple of years, and he really started to lose it. When the money ran out, he blamed my incompetence and took over the checkbook. Even when I kept perfect records and could account for every penny on Quicken, including little milk runs that I paid for with cash, it didn’t matter because he refused to look at the record. All he knew was that the money was gone and that it must be my fault. Why was it my fault? Because it was gone and he did not know where it went. This passes for logic around here.

Paying the bills had always been my job and he really stinks at it. He has no idea what he’s doing. For example, he believes that paying with cash is somehow better than paying with a check or debit card. (Clue: cash just vanishes into thin air, while a debit card leaves a record.) When the money is gone and we have nothing to show for it, it can’t be his fault because he is being so frugal, so it must be me who is spending it on some unknown, frivolous nonsense.

In general, living hand-to-mouth is more expensive than living like a normal person. Late fees and penalties are now a huge part of our budget. When you’re poor, you need to think ahead and plan. You know the bills are coming and roughly what they will be and you know that you have no hope of money falling out of the sky between now and then. So you pay the bill. The math is not difficult.

Then he opened his own checking account and deliberately sabotaged the joint checking account that I’d had for about thirty years. (I’m sure it sounds funny, but I had a sentimental attachment to it. I feel like he killed my pet or something.) I was forced to close it because he refused to stop certain automatic payments that I couldn’t legally stop, and refused to pay it, so that the bouncer fees kept piling up. I had to put it down.

When I turned around and opened a new one with a tiny balance, just to have something in my name, he freaked out as though – I really don’t know why he thinks he freaked out.

Then it was the credit card fiasco. I only have one major credit card in my name. I’m not using it and keeping a zero balance because I can’t pay it, but I need something in my name. If I let it go, there’s no way to get another without a better job history. He sent a nasty letter and tried to close it. I called them and told them to ignore him and again he freaked out.

Both cars are in his name… It’s like I don’t even exist.

I refuse to beg for anything for myself, so I haven’t bought clothes in years.

It got to the point where I had to beg and grovel for gas money to take the kids to school. He refused to fill the tank, claiming poverty, and kept me at a quarter tank or less. I don’t know where he thought I was going. Then he got mad at me when driving on empty screwed up the engine and he had to pay to get it fixed.

Can you say “isolation” and “dependant” and “power games”?

It’s kind of like being car sick. When I’m driving, I never get sick because my eyes do whatever it is they do and I’m fine. When I’m a passenger, I don’t know what to do with my eyes and it makes me physically sick. In the same way, the finances are out of control, the kitchen is out of control, everything is screwed up and my head is spinning.

I’m the most honest person he’s ever known or will ever know, yet he accuses me of lying just about every day. I can see now how being an Aspie can make me hard to read to someone who doesn’t know me, but come on. How long have you known me, and you haven’t even figured that out?

I discovered the concept of Asperger’s last June or so. I felt like the whole world opened up and everything suddenly made sense. WrongPlanet has become my main hangout. When I told him about it and tried to explain, he called me a hypochondriac. It was one of the biggest moments of my life, and he shut it down with a single word. There’s just no room in his head for it, and no room in his head for me. We haven’t talked about it since. At all.

Over the years, I retreated more and more to my little spot in the attic, with my computer and my books and stuff. When referring to the bedroom we shared for so long, he became more and more open in calling it “his” room. While I slept there and kept my clothes there, it hasn’t really been “mine” for a long time.

The last straw came last August. A major blowup that I won’t rehash here. I’ve been sleeping on the couch ever since. He’s beaten this relationship so dead, no power on earth will bring it back. The sight of him just makes me want to vomit.

Then the baby started high school in September. I have no idea what my kids do all day and have no mommy duties at all any more. It took a while to realize that the “empty nest syndrome” was adding to my depression. Who am I right now? I am nobody at all.

I did the math, and the bottom line is that my kids need a place to live. I can’t stay, but I can’t leave because I don’t have a real job. He is underemployed and can’t carry me in separate house. Alimony is impossible, we’re barely treading water as-is. I can sleep on the couch, eat the family food, benefit from existing healthcare through his employer (but can’t make the high co-pay). No apartment in this state would be cheaper than the monthly mortgage we pay now and there’s no way to divide ownership. Selling the house would start a downward spiral and then all four of us would be homeless. Perhaps he would like me to sleep in the park for the rest of my life. He would not consider it for himself, but it would be ok for me.

I am also acting as a human shield. Without me as his main, habitual scapegoat, he would turn on the kids. That would not be as soul-crushing now as it would have been when they were little, but it is still undesirable.

I get it now. It finally occurred to me in Early October what he had been saying for years. On and off for months, he would chase me up to my little hiding place to rant about whatever. He thinks I should either move out or reconcile. Going back to the way it was makes perfect sense to him. Then he would conclude his tirade by telling me to come to bed, meaning “come pay the rent.” Apparently, that’s all I’m good for. Ok, so now I’m a whore. How could a girl refuse an offer like that? It finally dawned on me that he’s been thinking that way for years. I feel violated, and dumbstruck with horror. I was so repulsed that I couldn’t figure out how to translate it back to him until around March. I managed to stop that particular rant about reconciliation by spelling it out. I probably shouldn’t have added, “You have no moral base.” Whatever. Saying it out loud just made me feel even dirtier.

I stopped a couple of other rants by saying, “I didn’t create this situation.” That stumped him. He has no idea what went wrong. I said, “I know.” He really has no idea.

Last edited by Tahitiii on 27 Mar 2009, 7:53 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I really feel for your situation. Being stuck between a rock and a hard place is not easy on anyone. It seems like your hubby has his own set of issues to contend with and it doesn't seem like he is willing to do anything about it unless he hits rock bottom (and even then it seems up for debate.) My first instinct was to advise against putting up with the abusive behavior. It isn't worth the loss of self but I do feel for you in that you are trying to do the best for your kids (even if it is hard on you). Would you be able to talk to a women's shelter in your area to see if there is something you can do to remove you and the kids from this situation?

I think you stated something very important in your first post about "It's not about who has what disorder. It's about tolerance and a refusal to try, and it's about equality vs. power. Either side can be guilty." I understand this issue to be more to do with feeling beaten down by the person who is suppose to support you, more so than NT/AS wiring. "Cassandra" is just a label to identify common feelings associated with being in such a situation where you feel alone, lost, and unable to take action because there is a lack of understanding to the depth of the problem and no one to support you. It isn't easy to extracate ourselves from these type of situations either when just one partner has awareness and the other person does not hold the same awareness. But building up our own support system (therapists, group support, friends, clergy, family...those who listen and believe you) is a very important first step for reclaiming ourselves from the hurt.

I don't have much for answers, just a sympathetic heart, and a t-shirt labeled "Been there".

Tahitiii,

What Jezabel suggested about finding a womens or family shelter is the right thing to do. Here are my suggestions:

Preferably don't tell your husband or kids what you are doing: thoroughly research available shelters in your area and also those just beyond your immediate area. Find out about red tape, availability, etc. Sometimes the red tape involved in doing these things is unbelievable. Find out about waiting lists. Let's assume after several hours of research, phone calls, questions, and appointment scheduling [if possible, make it a phone appointment rather than a go-to appointment]....you determine there are 2 or 3 options. You need to choose one and find a way to get there. Just to see what it is like, not to check in. You also need to talk to whoever is in charge of red tape and who is in charge of the actual running of the shelter. Try to talk to some of the women staying there and see if they like it.

If that one place isn't acceptable, move on to another option. Do the same. Go there in person. Check it out.

When you locate an acceptable alternative to your present situation--frankly I think living under a bridge would be preferable to your situation, but I know you want to protect the kids. So when you find an acceptable alternative....decide how you are going to proceed.

The bottom line is you have to do the impossible. You have to stay cool, calm and collected and promise yourself a good cry [or several long baths or whatever else is therapeutic] once this is all under control. In the meantime keep working on how you are going to move you and the kids out of there or whatever else you decide to do.

Women's support groups will most likely be your best allies. Contact them.


Edit: deleted rambling portions of the post

Last edited by alba on 27 Mar 2009, 6:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Thanks, guys. The sympathy alone is worth so much. I don't know what I would do without this place.

I have tried a bunch of stuff. So far, everything is a dead-end.

I would need a diagnosis to get any sympathy from people like that. I can't get a diagnosis. You need a ton of money and time, and you need an elaborate song and dance. I don't get dramatic and cry and carry on when I'm depressed. When I'm ok, I seem intelligent and articulate, and seem to know what's going on. When I'm not ok, I shut down and become non-verbal. So all they see is a blank, on which they can project whatever they like. It doesn't matter what I say. The shrinks want to be properly entertained. Sorry, I'm an Aspie. I don't do choreography.

I have a distant relative who's trying to get "temporary assistance." Her actual situation is more dire than mine, and she is more outgoing than I am. She has spent a lot of time and energy on it, and so far has seen no payoff. I can't jump through those hoops. The begging and crying and butt kissing and exaggerating and outright lying she has done are worthy of an academy award. Just watching her makes me tired. If all of their applicants are like that, there's no way I can compete.

Tahitiii, I hate to tell you this....but you may have to lie in order to get assistance. And you may have to get assistance for you and the kids. It used to be called AFDC....Aid to Families with Dependent Children.

Being on welfare used to require you to lie or you don't get on it. If you want to survive [by being on welfare] you lie. It may not be that way now. But it used to be.

The first half of your post seemed to me to be a replica of the domestic abuse advertisements I've seen on buses over the last few months.

Obviously, your ideal solution would be to divorce and move out, but clearly in your financial situation this is a no-go. I know you've said that you refuse to work sh***y jobs, but maybe in your current situation you might need to make the sacrifice in order to improve your life. What if you just worked a sh***y job (and tried really hard at it) long enough to put it on your resume, and get a good reference, then try to work your way from bottom up? It seems to me that your only hope of independence will be if you can financially support yourself, which sucks in your situation (not having good references), but I can't see any other way around it. Sometimes you can find sh***y jobs with good people who don't treat you badly, maybe just keep trying till you find one.

Either way, I really feel for you, and believe me - you're not a hypochondriac - anyone who comes to this site, and still thinks they're an aspie after reading the posts on this site is the real deal. I have learned more about my AS from this site than I have learned in my entire life from books and psychologists.

I feel that way too sometimes.

I take s**t jobs. They just don't last. Fifteen months is my record.
They always end in a witch hunt. I'm a walking mirror.
People who take those jobs usually don't like themselves.

They don't add up to much on a resume, either.

It doesn't matter what I do. I've tried every possible approach.
I had better luck when I was an obnoxious kid and didn't try.
So that's the next experiment, if I ever get another job.


Oh – another angle I forgot. I’m still on the Board of Trustees at my kids’ old school. He hates that. He has actually yelled about it, as though it’s a bad thing. He sneers at every opportunity, and uses any excuse to say nasty things about people I like. The more I play it down and let him think of it as some silly hen party, the easier my life is.

If I say I’m going to a support group, that’s fine. I suppose it’s an admission that I’m defective or something.

I think you need to get some legal advice - moving out of the home can put you in a 'weak' position legally. Why can't he move out?

What an effing control freak. That's what it's all about. If he's interested in reconciliation he should be willing to look at his own flaws too.

Thanks to everyone. I got some good PMs out of this thread. We have a lot of supportive people around here.

Been there, done that. I don't have that kind of money, and talking to them does nothing but annoy me. I get better feed back from you guys, it's free, and it's at my pace. That long post above -- there's no way that I could have explained that in an office visit, no matter how much time I had.

About getting legal advice -- Well, legal secretary is what I did best and where I should be now. While I never did much with family law, I figured I had a general idea of how it works. I checked it out anyway and had a free consultation through the local women's center. No surprises there. Basically, if you can't amicably figure something out between you, you turn it over to the legal system and they proceed to take everything you own. Problem solved. (Kind of like Solomon's solution of cutting the baby in half.) The only good part is that hubby thinks I know more than I do, so he is as afraid to rock the boat as I am. He somehow manages to avoid the most obvious forms of abuse.

This morning's tirade: Now I'm abusing him. I didn't say it out loud, but to myself I thought: Ok, you chase me into a corner, you force my hand into a fist, smack your face with it and call it abuse. Did you, perchance, notice that I am the one hiding in the attic while you have the run of the house? Actually, I'm sure that he noticed, and believes this is the way it should be.

To just go running off without a long-term plan won't solve anything. I don't need a crystal ball to figure out how that will end. I have a good imagination and I can think of how things could be much worse.
Especially with the hard times that are coming for everyone. The overburdened soup kitchens and permanent, legal tent cities will be only the beginning.

What did the slaves do? Nothing. Just shut up and take it, day after day, year after year. Sometimes, there is no solution. The most dramatic thing you can do is spit in the master's cup. (Passive-aggressive and pointless.) Not my style, and it really won't change anything. I can imagine a kid getting some kind of emotional satisfaction out of that, but it's too transparent at my age. It would just make me feel like an idiot.

Life goes on.

My daughter is in a play tonight. Three performances, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. They've been rehearsing like crazy. Her walk has changed lately -- You'd think she was someone important, the way she throws her hair back and all that. It's probably the biggest moment of her life. Too bad the old man can't leave it alone and just let everyone enjoy it, that he has to get his subtle digs in at every opportunity. We're going on different days with different groups of relatives, so at least I don't need to sit with him.

I have a temp job coming up for the 2010 Census. I still don't know how it's going to work, but the training week is April 13-17. It'll be something new to focus on, and at home we can pretend there's something going on. He'll make his stupid comments, of course, and I'll pretend to be deaf and/or stupid. I think I have a realistic hope that this job will have some intrinsic value and won't be abusive. Too bad it can't be permanent.

- - - - - - - - - - Update - - - - - - - - - -

Ok, I think I have a partial solution, but it’s so non-standard, I’m afraid to say it out loud. So I’m going to run it by you guys.

Background:

Jack is my husband’s little brother, age 40. A heroine addict for decades, his own mother still has a restraining order against him. But he’s one of the smartest people I’ve known.
Nancy has a similar history, though not the sharpest knife in the drawer, plus bipolar, plus narcissistic, plus a hysterectomy last November. She’s a basket case.

They’ve been on the wagon for the past year or so. They really seem to be trying to behave. Charity care pays for Nancy’s drugs and other medical needs, in theory at least. My mother-in-law is paying for Joe’s doctor, who provides anxiety meds and god knows what else. The mother has a ton of money and will pay partial rent when necessary and any other reasonable needs. She wants him to clean up his act and knows that she can be a sucker, so she often lets my husband be the liaison between them. (Did I mention the shed around here somewhere? Well, that part is over.)

Jack has a marginal job with a landscaper that varies with the seasons and the weather. The boss has offered them a little house, with cheap rent, but it’s about a 15 or 20 minute drive out in the woods. While it’s less than perfect, this might actually work for them for the long term. The only downside is that neither of them has a realistic hope of getting a driver’s license back any time soon. Jack will get a ride to work, but Nancy will certainly suffer from cabin fever.

Ok, so here’s the deal:

We rent one of the rooms from Jack on a month-to-month basis, and hubby and I would switch places periodically. No promises, no long-term commitment. Between the four of us (hubby, myself and the two kids) we would have the understanding that anyone can go to either house, any time, until we figure out a pattern that works.

I figure hubby has no chance of staying alone for long. His ego requires him to have a babe on his arm at all times. I wouldn’t want him to be totally dishonest about it, but neither do I want them drooling all over each other with the kids around. Being able to switch places would make it possible to find a balance on that issue.

We can’t afford two real houses with bedrooms for each kid. Also, nobody is going to want to live in the woods. School is here, their toys are here, there’s nothing out there except maybe the novelty, which will probably wear out quickly. And the common practice of making the kids bounce back and forth never made sense to me anyway – why should their lives be disrupted, just because their Dad is a jerk?

It would help the dynamic duo in a few ways. Nancy has a four-year-old daughter. The ex-husband has 100% custody and Nancy is such a basket case that she can only have supervised visits. Either one of us could supervise. We could also give her a ride once in a while, so she can pretend to go job hunting or just to get out.

Please feel free to comment. Am I being unrealistic? Or is this just too crazy?

hmm it's something yeah, not knowing the couple involved it's rather hard to say, recovering heroin addicts...sounds like trouble, but you've got trouble if you do nothing too.

see how it goes.