First time in history!! !! The NT/AS open hotline ! !! !! !

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I think I can read expressions fairly well when I'm not in the conversation. But when I'm in the conversation it feels like things are happening faster and between paying attention to what they're saying and my own thoughts my ablility to read the expressions gets degraded.

I am not exactly NT but I'll answer the question. I can read facial expressions as well as any NT. I can tell for the most part how I am perceived by others and can tell if I fit in with a group or not. I can read emotions and can tell for the most part what people are thinking. Not all the clues are obvious but I can usually pick up on hints. Some times people hide what they are thinking so it can be difficult for an NT to figure out what other people are thinking.

They may be happy to be around you but still not really know how to interact with you.

I really can't say for sure because it's not like I tend to ask people "did you get what that expression meant?" when I don't know.

But I'm assuming I don't, since I certainly can't always tell what an expression means, and I assume I'm more often baffled than others.
But neither am I blind to them. I could certainly read some facial expressions even when I was little.


I don't know how mild my AS is, but for me, there is no conscious thinking when I see an expression I recognize.
For instance, once when I was six, I had done something bad, and as I came home I saw my mother standing there waiting, and I immediately saw that she was very angry (turned out she had gotten a call from my grandmother telling her what happened). There was no conscious deciphering, just seeing it, and immediately know I was in trouble, lol. (And I was. Got a solid scolding for what I had done.) My physical reaction was to come to a full stop the moment I saw her face and then slowly slink towards her and face the music.
My thoughts were something like "uh-oh" followed by trying to make excuses for what I had done.


For me, the conscious thinking only starts when I can't tell for sure, or don't know at all.

A more recent example from about 10-15 or so years ago (when I was somewhere in my 20's) is someone in the neighborhood who had schizophrenia. I thought her smile was all wrong. It was just wrong and creeped me out. It was an immediate reaction to seeing it. IDK if it was the disease or the medications she was on, but it was like seeing something trying to come off as human. I can't tell at all how it was wrong, what she did 'wrong'.
After I learned about Asperger's I remembered that incident (I was reexamining my entire life) and asked my mother, who had also known that woman, and she had had the exact same reaction.

I can't just look at somebody and "know" how they are feeling through empathy. I'm missing that.

That said, my personality subtype is an INTJ. I systematise everything, including reading body language and facial expressions. I can logically deduce what particular facial expressions are intended to communicate very quickly with a high degree of confidence.

I personally don't have any trouble with non-verbal communication most of the time.
Although that's probably because I was taught how to do that sort of thing at a very young age.

I've been reading different posts trying to figure out where I can ask some questions and get some help. I'm married to aspie man and am so confused. I want our relationship to work and I want us to be happy together but sometimes it's so difficult. He is so kind and intelligent and a really good person. We just have trouble communicating. I thought it might be easier to right things out instead of talking since we tend to go in circles when we talk. I wrote emails but he ignores them or takes one sentence and replies to that. I tried texts but similar issues. How can I effectively communicate to be heard? He refuses to go to therapy. He refused to even come online and check out these discussions and web-sites. He seems so alone and isolated but is very functional and has a great job. Just no friends. And I'm just learning about Asperger's but not sure how to proceed. Also, is baby-talk normal? Do people here engage in that in private, not socially.

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As in, talking to someone like they were a baby? I've never heard it mentioned here before, so I don't think it's common. Of course, who knows what kind of weird things people do in private!

As for the rest of your post, maybe start a new topic about it either here in General Autism Discussion or in Love & Dating.

Your husband needs to make an effort. If his aspergers is mild enough that he can hold onto a great job, he should be able to hold a conversation with you. The problem is that it's difficult. All of us Aspergers people get accused of not communicating enough/properly in relationships. Even in friendships. The fact that your husband has no friends points to him being a particularly poorly communicating Aspie. I'd wager a guess that his job involves little or no sales work or working with the community directly.

He needs to put himself through the anguish (And it can quite literally be anguish) of getting help and making an effort to communicate. You can't be expected to put up with this forever. I personally am willing to go to therapy and group therapy, which I do, in an effort to improve myself socially. I don't understand other Aspies' resistance to this concept, but I see it all the time, particularly in my father.

Is your husband one of those "I don't have a problem, YOU all have a problem" kind of Aspies? Or does he awknowledge his difficulties?

Has he always been this way or has it worsened with age? What reasons would you say he has no friends? What causes that?

When he responds to only one sentence in your emails, what sort of sentences does he pick out?

These are such great questions mistersprinkles!! ! I guess I just wanted to know if this was typical Aspie behavior. But you said you're willing to go to therapy (even group therapy) which I find so great! Yes, he's the type that thinks it's all me although he's getting better with that. He would never take any responsibility for anything he would do or say and never apologize for anything. But he's actually getting better with that as I'm learning how to let him know in a gentle way (rather than getting really angry myself). I'm not sure why he doesn't have any friends. I told him that friendship requires work which means calling people or emailing, going out with them or inviting them over....he has to somehow make contact. He used to play computer games when he was younger but he doesn't even chat online with anyone anymore. Just plays on his own. How can I help him have some friends?
And he's actually working with people in community. He's so kind and good with people which is what I had found so confusing. But it's structured format and short. He's totally different at home.
And what he picks out from what I say is different each time (that's a great question that never occurred to me before) so I'm not sure.
So I'm not sure how to get my point across...basically that I will be here and support him in any way I can if he just gets some help (therapy perhaps or anything else that works for him). One day he'll say maybe he has a problem but then the next day he'll deny he ever said it and will say he's fine and doesn't need any help. For the longest time I thought I was just crazy so I'm in therapy. Our conversations can be so 'crazy-making'.

Im not ASD, but there is something hard for me to understand: how does disagreeable people manage to fit in society? are social habilities that important after all? I mean, I know people who enjoy been mean to others, and still they have friends, and sometimes they even have a couple who is submissive to them.

You may never be able to convince him to make friends. I had a best friend on the ASD spectrum who I stopped being friends with because he literally no longer had a desire for platonic relationships. He said they were a waste of time. We had several 3-4 hour long discussions about this and he convinced me that he was 100% serious. He literally did not want any friends. He wanted "productive relationships" where he could secure either sex, or business contracts, things like that. Means to an end.

There may be nothing you can do about this. Some of us are doomed to be alone unless we can find someone who truly understands us, and it sounds like you have a very hard time understanding your significant other's (possibly irreversible) limitations. He may be literally incapable of changing. He may be incapable of realizing that he's damaging the relationship that he's in with you. Clearly, he has what alcoholics refer to as "moments of clarity" where he tells you that you're right, and you sound like you fell that these are genuine, and not "Shut up!" measures. But he doesn't act on them. Thinking something and acting on it are two very distinct things for people on the spectrum. Sometimes it is impossible to connect the dots. Every night for the past week I layed in bed and thought "I HAVE to take the recycling out tomorrow". It took a week. I had to force myself to do it today. We're just wired differently.

If this relationship is driving you as crazy as it sounds like it is (seeking therapy), you may have to come to the point of an ultimatum. "You get help or I leave you" kind of thing. Said gently and non confrontationally, of course. Confronting an Aspie is never good and is highly unproductive.

He absolutely needs to go to therapy. Group therapy would be good in my opinion, maybe non ASD/ASD couples, where the non-ASD can share their frustration and the ASD can share their frustration with their partner's frustration. That would be a start.

Medication, psychiatrist/psychotherapist, group therapy. I'd start there. If you can convince him.

IMO she should just let him be. It's not a problem that he doesn't have any friends if he doesn't want any. It's her having a problem with it that is the problem.

At least some of us have no desire for RL friends. I don't want any and never did. I'm all about my interests. Last thing I wanna do is have people ruin my interests for me by trying to become part of them, or stop me from spending time doing them.
We're not like you, and you have to accept that. For some reason that seems to be a hard thing for Nts to get. I've had that struggle with their kind all my life and it's a PITA. I'm not nt and I don't wanna be!

Yes, he has a right to resist friendship, yes he has a right to ignore his wife. But by that same logic, his wife has a right to divorce him and leave him.

He has to recognize that he is in a relationship with an NT person, not another ASD person, and that NTs have certain expectations out of interpersonal relationships that MUST be met. If they are not met, the NT will usually eventually terminate the relationship.

This man has to learn how to, at very least, communicate properly with his wife or he is going to lose her.

Whether or not he has any friends is not her business. Any nt who tried to tell me I MUST have friends to fulfill their expectations would get an address to a hot fiery place from me. I would never allow any nt to ruin my spare time. It's bad enough how much they mess up the time we have to spend around them in school/ work for those in school/employment.

The man has a right to be himself and if that's not good enough, then IMO he is better off without her.

Of course they need to be able to communicate with each other, that's very important. But his having friends or not is not part of that.

Women need men who have friends. They're very strange creatures.