Re: Re: AS and Choice

[Guest guest]

> To me AS is more than a difference. I consider myself defective rather than

broken. I am missing a sense that NTs have. This sense is similar to being blind

or deaf but not so obvious or disabling.

Steve, I feel much the same. I too regard AS as a defect, as I lack the

sort of communication awareness and skills to form and sustain

meaningful connections with others, connections that are at the core of

our humanity.

I see nothing to celebrate here, I'm afraid. To me, celebrating AS

seems like so much of a defensive mechanism. Would these same folks

also celebrate chronic and life-changing neurological conditions such as

Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and MS as mere 'differences' in which to take

pride? Somehow, I think not.

> I also believe that many of the behaviours, typical of people with AS, are

symptoms of coping mechanisms, learned from an early age, to deal with the root

cause, the missing sense. I also believe that these behaviours can be unlearned

with the right guidance and support.

I agree. The key seems to be the right guidance and support. Of

course, mileage will vary depending on the severity of the AS and the

age at which interventions begin.

> I read about Cassandra Syndrome shortly after realizing about my AS. I was

absolutely devastated by numerous accounts by women from various backgrounds. I

felt so guilty of what I had been putting my wife through, inadvertently, for

all of those years.

I feel similar guilt myself, Steve. Which is why I feel some

responsibility for the constellation of circumstances that resulted in

my husband's suicide. While he had issues of his own, the stresses that

my (as then unknown) AS brought to the marriage certainly didn't help

the situation any.

> And now to the crux of the question: choice. Everyone has choices, including

choices about how to behave. In my case, I do not intend to behave

inappropriately or cause hurt. I would always choose to behave in a way that is

acceptable to and did not offend others. However, I have great difficulty doing

this. I understand that this is not the type of choice that you wish to address

but the following example helps me to illustrate a point made above. This

example is very recent, from earlier this week. I will not go into details but I

can say that I behaved inappropriately, by answering some questions in an

insensitive way. I have since been admonished for it. I did not choose to behave

inappropriately and I had no idea that I had even done anything wrong, until I

was informed later. Yes, I felt really bad about it. So, how did this come

about? My own analysis of the event is that I was in a very relaxed atmosphere

and so my reasoning head was not fully attentive and I was not aware of how

sensitive the particular issue was. An NT would have most likely picked up the

sensitivity of the issue and responded more appropriately without thinking. So,

I opened my mouth and put my foot in it. I don't have an answer yet on how I can

address this. Without the ability to sniff out sensitive issues and without a

technique to address not seeing the blindingly obvious I can choose several

courses of action to prevent reoccurrence, each of which result in different AS

typical behaviours.

I could have written the above, Steve. I've been here so many times myself.

> Put over simply you may be asking the question, " If your partner loved you,

why would my partner choose to do or not to do something, particularly if it is

something that he should know you might appreciate? If he loved you, why would

your partner choose not to cherish you more often, particularly as you know that

he can choose to for the special event, e.g. the Valentine's day example? I have

been guilty of choosing not to do some nice things and since done much

self-analysis of my own behaviour. The answer is fear and apathy. I always knew

that my wife would like more attention from me and would appreciate small tokens

that showed my appreciation for her, from time to time. I was not good at this.

In the early days, I did try but the outcome was often a disaster. I would

either do things that were not appropriate for the occasion or totally miss-read

how my wife was feeling and miss-time my good intent badly. I do not like

getting things wrong and so I became fearful. It became easier to do nothing

than do the wrong thing consistently. I know that this is not good enough.

I can so relate to the above. I really like the way you expressed this,

Steve.

> Getting things wrong consistently is at the core of my AS. I have to reason

through everything that I do. I can make very quick decisions about highly

important and complex issues, providing that I have some factual basis to base

my reasoning and judgement. But, ask me what colour curtains I should put in the

living room or what I would like for dinner and I am stumped totally. I lack the

ability to come to decisions intuitively. This is something that most NT's do

well. They seem able to process much more than I can in real time, by somehow

doing much of the reasoning off line. Until I discovered about my AS, I believed

that everybody had thought processes that were similar to mine and had to reason

everything through. I now understand that this is far from true. In deciding on

a gift, for example, I would try to put myself in my wife's shoes, and I would

get her something I would like if I was in her situation. I would look for all

sorts of clues about what she would like but I could never tap into how she

really felt. I would never have considered buying flowers, for example, because

they had no practical use for her. I would never have considered the gift as

just nice. I very often would choose not to do something because I did stop and

think.

I'm more intuitive than you in this respect (and I understand the value

of impractical nice gifts), yet I too have some difficulty in this

area. The degree just seems to be less severe, that's all.

> I wish I could turn the clock back.

I've lost count of how many times each day that I repeat this mantra to

myself. More self-flagellation, as the past is water under the bridge.

> I now know that I don't have to understand why my wife would like something I

just have to appreciate that she does. I also realise that I will likely

continue to get things wrong unless I find a special workaround or get

assistance from somebody else. There are women, whose opinions I can seek about

nice/romantic gifts, who can help me and I can set out lists and timetables to

prompt me when to do something nice.

These are all good insights, IMO. Don't you wish that we could figure

these things out long before the relationship is damaged? Sigh....

> Even with my marriage in the poor state that it is currently in, I too went

out of my way to buy my wife something nice for Valentine's day, which I left

for her to find when I went to work. She sent me a very terse email in return

telling me not to do it again. She still ate the chocolates though.

It sounds like your relationship is at the point where mine was when I

started to become aware of AS and began learning how to compensate for

some of my traits. The phrase often used in these situations is " too

little, too late " . There does come a point where so much damage has

been done that any nice gestures are no longer welcomed or appreciated.

In fact, they may even become uncomfortable to the recipient, for whom

the emotional connection no longer exists.

> grieving at loss or what may have been

Yes.

Best,

~CJ