findingnemo Posted April 17, 2012 Posted April 17, 2012 That's my husband:o Well, in that case, he has some good qualities too. There will be people who like him the way he is. Why not try to accept him as he is and not apologize for him to other people? That is if you find he doesn't have a disease.
frozensprouts Posted April 17, 2012 Posted April 17, 2012 my oldest daughter has aspergers and while you husband may also have aspergers, to be honest ( and please note...I am not a psychologist0 just based on the fact that he can come off as snobby or rude, that doesn't mean he has apsergers. here are some charcteristics of aspergers (do you feel these apply to your husband?) i. difficulty "reading' people via non verbal cues ii. lack of affect in facial expressions ( e.g.- many people with aspergers don't show appropriate facial expressions- don't smile when they are happy, don't frown when sad, etc.) iii- rigidity and need to structure their environment iv- fixation on odd things vi- an odd sense of humor vii- odd tone of voice ( my daughter speaks in a monotone)...there may be little affect in tone or a lack of expressiveness viii- "hyperlexia"- having large vocabulary, or they tend to use large , ponderous words ix- difficulties with coordination x- people with aspergers are often very intelligent and some have extreme intelligence in a certain area of interest xi- great difficulties with social interaction xii- extreme 'black or white' thinking xiii- often there is an obsessive need to "schedule" everything ( hard to explain, but it goes way beyond the norm) xv- sensitivity to external stimuli ( either hyper or hyposensitive) xvi- people with aspergers are more prone to depression, anxiety disorders and obsessive compulsive disorder than the general population. this is often found to be a function of an abnormality in the neuorfunctioning of the brain, and not not as a result of external influences aspergers is believed to be a neurological condition, and to reflect an abnormality in the way the brain process external sensory input, social cues, etc. You can treat the different aspects of the condition and people with it can often learn better social behavior, but it's not "curable"... if you feel your husband does have aspergers, there's a really good website called wrongplanet.org that has some great info , links and forums for everyone from kids and parents to adults...you may find it really helpful to you best of luck to you:)
lv1028 Posted April 17, 2012 Posted April 17, 2012 While it could be some type of syndrome, it also sounds like resentment, anger and sarcasm (2nd cousin to anger so to speak). He sounds like a dutiful husband...maybe this is his way of lashing out. But he sounds angry to me.
standtall Posted April 18, 2012 Posted April 18, 2012 Apergers=another over used, ex post facto diagnosis that in most cases is used to describe someone who wasn't taught to socialize properly.
beenburned Posted April 18, 2012 Posted April 18, 2012 Could he be passive-agressive? It would explain the hidden anger/rage.
frozensprouts Posted April 18, 2012 Posted April 18, 2012 Apergers=another over used, ex post facto diagnosis that in most cases is used to describe someone who wasn't taught to socialize properly. ( this will be my only off topic post- I promise ...seriously!) I would tend to agree somewhat. Aspergers is real, but most people who don't socialize well don't have aspergers...there are usually other reasons I have been told I have a mild form of it, and both my parents are very social, and tried to teach me to be like them, but no matter how hard i tried, I just couldn't. Used to drive them ( and me) crazy. I could never 'get' people, and it used to make me really sad, but now I know why, and I know there are things I can do to compensate.( I was adopted, and I both my parents and I believe that the cause is a genetic predisposition)... I breaks my heart sometimes to see my daughter try to socialize...it's been such a struggle for her. She is also really trusting, but since she can't read people's non-verbal cues, she gets taken advantage of really easily. She really wants people to like her, but thinks no one does ( but her teachers tell me they do...I tell her that, but sometimes i don't think she believes me)... she also finds conversation really hard as she finds the volume of people's speech to be really 'loud" even when it is not ( part of the sensory processing aspect of aspergers...her psychologist is helping her with that)... I think a lot of people have heard about aspergers, and tend to think taht everyone who doesn't socialize well must have it, but it's a lot more than just not socializing well... it's like someone who is deaf...they can learn to read lips or learn sign language to compensate, but they will never 'learn" to hear
Author tomswife Posted April 19, 2012 Author Posted April 19, 2012 i. difficulty "reading' people via non verbal cues iii- rigidity and need to structure their environment vi- an odd sense of humor viii- "hyperlexia"- having large vocabulary, or they tend to use large , ponderous words. Frozen sprout, my husband has the above character.
standtall Posted April 19, 2012 Posted April 19, 2012 Aspergers is real, but most people who don't socialize well don't have aspergers...there are usually other reasons tomswife...read that part. I'm sure that you didn't marry someone with aspergers. Stop looking for excuses or the magic diagnosis, and help him in other ways.
frozensprouts Posted April 19, 2012 Posted April 19, 2012 if you really feel he has aspergers, then i would suggest that you seek an appointment with a psychologist/psychiatrist to get him tested...( ignore those online 'tests", as most of them aren't accurate)... the thing is, even if he does have aspergers ( and, to be honest, it sounds more to me like he just has a quirky personality type) why are you asking him to change who he is? If you feel he is unhappy or even depressed due to his inability to connect with others, that's one thing. But if you are asking him to make a change to the fundamental part of who he is ( and who he always was)because he embarrasses you, The are you really being fair to him? It's one thing to say " honey, please don't talk like that or tell those kinds of jokes in front of our neighbors/friends because they might be offended", but it's quite another to tell him he needs to make fundamental changes to the very core of his being just to save you embarrassment... if you are simply asking him to "behave himself in public' and he doesn't seem to know how to, you may suggest that you have a secret "signal' with him that you do when he is doing/saying something he shouldn't ( a tug at your earlobe, etc.)...that may help him
frozensprouts Posted April 19, 2012 Posted April 19, 2012 tomswife...read that part. I'm sure that you didn't marry someone with aspergers. Stop looking for excuses or the magic diagnosis, and help him in other ways. trust me...a diagnosis of aspergers is a double edged sword. "it's helped my daughter to understand why she is so 'different", but really, she hates that she's different. It makes her very, very sad, and nothing i say seems to change anything... saying 'you're different because you have aspergers' really changes nothing...
angie2443 Posted April 19, 2012 Posted April 19, 2012 [quote=frozensprouts;3948086 she can't read people's non-verbal cues, she gets taken advantage of really easily. I was wondering, would getting a book on facial expresions or body language help? I have attention deficit disorder. I realize this is very differant from what your daughter has. Still, I sometimes have a hard time reading people because it is so hard for me to stay focused in a conversion at times. It's like I'm missing a lot of information (from not observing non-verbal cues) that I'm only hearing half of what a person is telling me. It helped me to study facial expressions and know exactly what they mean. It just makes it easiar to see a genuine smile, a smirk, etc. I hope it gets easiar for your daughter. I know it's painful when you want to connect with people but something about you is getting in the way.
angie2443 Posted April 19, 2012 Posted April 19, 2012 Apergers=another over used, ex post facto diagnosis that in most cases is used to describe someone who wasn't taught to socialize properly. I would partly agree. I also know there are really mental disorders, caused by actually physical causes (neurotransmiters, etc), that get misdiagnosed or ignored completely. My concern for the OP would be that her husband is bieng abusive (passive-agressive, saying hurtful things and then pretending that he doesn't know any better) and it's not bieng seen because he hides it well and it is bieng confused with a mental disorder. I know little of Apergers and I don't know enough about OP's husband to make a good guess at what's going on. My only advice would be to watch and see if the husband can control some of his harmful behaviors when it benifits him.
frozensprouts Posted April 19, 2012 Posted April 19, 2012 I was wondering, would getting a book on facial expresions or body language help? I have attention deficit disorder. I realize this is very differant from what your daughter has. Still, I sometimes have a hard time reading people because it is so hard for me to stay focused in a conversion at times. It's like I'm missing a lot of information (from not observing non-verbal cues) that I'm only hearing half of what a person is telling me. It helped me to study facial expressions and know exactly what they mean. It just makes it easiar to see a genuine smile, a smirk, etc. I hope it gets easiar for your daughter. I know it's painful when you want to connect with people but something about you is getting in the way. what you say makes a lot of sense, and it is very good advice, but the problem is that the facial expressions/non verbal cues just don't seem to "register" with her ( as I said in a previous post, i have a mild form of apsergers, and it's kind of hard to explain, but I really don't see the smile, frown, etc.- which means that i end up often staring at people trying to read their expressions...kind of "off putting' to others to say the least...finding the balance between "maintaining eye contact and "staring' is really hard ) people with aspergers/autism often have really poor eye contact. Why look at someone if it's not going to help you communicate with them? My daughter is like this...she looks away when she talks to you, and I have to remind her to look at people when she talks to them. I've learned to do this, but i don't do it for any reason other than it makes it easier for the other person I'm talking to. Does nothing for me...faces aren't "interesting"....funnily enough, a lot of babies who go on to be diagnosed later in life with autism/aspergers don't have that natural facination with human faces that most babies have...I know both of my children who have autism spectrum disorders were like that, even as infants ( you may find the wrongplanet website helpful...there's some good stuff in there for people with add, ad/hd, hd, etc... ( all the "alphabet soup"-lol)
Author tomswife Posted May 16, 2012 Author Posted May 16, 2012 I would partly agree. I also know there are really mental disorders, caused by actually physical causes (neurotransmiters, etc), that get misdiagnosed or ignored completely. My concern for the OP would be that her husband is bieng abusive (passive-agressive, saying hurtful things and then pretending that he doesn't know any better) and it's not bieng seen because he hides it well and it is bieng confused with a mental disorder. I know little of Apergers and I don't know enough about OP's husband to make a good guess at what's going on. My only advice would be to watch and see if the husband can control some of his harmful behaviors when it benifits him. I don't think he is passive agressive. I don't think he is abusive either even though it does feel like abuse when he yells. He generally talks loud because he can't hear himself well (one ear damamged) so he thinks that other people can't hear either. He is a good man but because of his condescending voice NO one likes him and he has NO friends.
standtall Posted May 16, 2012 Posted May 16, 2012 . He is a good man but because of his condescending voice NO one likes him and he has NO friends. Again, try a Dale Carnegie class..it works wonders.
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