My wife has High functioning Autism

She was beautiful. Everyone liked her. She was kind, loving and very generous. She had a high profile job in education and liked all the things I did. We had wonderful times at rock concerts, parties with my friends, picnics and dinners. She helped me whenever she could with my work. I returned all this affection and love with gratitude that I had finally found the woman of my dreams. That I had found someone who could love this red headed motor bike riding man. We could hardly wait to get married and start a family.

It all very swiftly turned into a nightmare. Ten months after our marriage when little Georgina was born, nothing would ever be the same. My wife became very distant and cold. I thought it might be post-natal depression and encouraged her to see a doctor. She wouldn’t go. She denied there was a problem. She was still working in her job and the baby was going to day care. Whenever I tried to talk to her about what had changed in our marriage she shut down. She refused to talk. She didn’t cry or run away; just coldly refused to acknowledge anything was wrong.

When she did occasionally respond she said all she had to do was keep the baby and the home clean and lie back dutifully on the bed for husband to satisfy himself. I wanted more, much more. I wanted a companion, a lover who participated, without making me feel like I was using her.

It was when Georgina went to school and was diagnosed with Asperger’s and put into a special education class that my wife came clean and admitted she also had Asperger’s and had known all along. I was angry and betrayed. I moved into another room. I could not stand to see the two of them together. How they belittled me and made fun of me in hurtful ways. They ganged up together. Georgina was being taught to ridicule her father. She became hard for me to discipline. She didn’t want to play doll’s house with me anymore. She wouldn’t come with me when I went for a bike ride.

Now Georgina is nine. My wife was very angry when Georgina’s teacher finally told the truth. This was the first teacher to scold my wife, telling her that Georgina could not read. That she was un-co-operative in class and would not participate to enable her to learn to read: that the critical time for learning was rapidly disappearing. My wife had believed that rainbows and unicorns would fill the void in hers and Georgina’s life. The teacher told her the time for unicorns was past. Luckily friends of my wife supported the teacher. They told my wife that the teacher had done Georgina a great service: that my wife needed to listen.

Things have not changed at all. I can’t make any connection with my daughter or my wife. I have been working away from home all week for several years, only returning on weekends. It is the only way to get some respite from the mind twisting nonsense and defiance coming from the two of them. It is not a home, it’s an asylum.

I fill my time on weekends riding my bike with other friends. I can’t stay too long at home. I hate what it has become there. I fear for my daughter’s future.
Why didn’t I know about Asperger’s before I got married? I would never have done it.

© Reuben 2014