how did your partner respond when you began to suspect you may be on the spectrum but undiagnosed?
Interested in hearing from experiences that don't directly align with the question as well.
"What? But you're normal, like me. long pause, thinking face Hm."
She divorced me. Apparently she had spent the last nine years waiting for my autistic traits to go away. Once she started to realise they were a part of me, she began secretly looking for her own place and then left without warning.
"yeah, no shit. i though you knew this already"
I got this from a few friends lol. Apparently, it's pretty obvious that I'm autistic, but I had absolutely no self-awareness. I have a natural tendency to choose other autistic people to socialize with. I would think they were normal, authentic, interesting, easy to communicate with, and accepting. Meanwhile, I thought most people were inauthentic, shallow, hard to understand, and judgmental. Now that I know I'm autistic, I understand that:
I still prefer autistics because they're just my people and we get along much better, but have more understanding and acceptance of NT behaviors. Anyway, when I found out I was autistic, a some of them were like, "We thought you knew...it's pretty obvious."
was a bit of a running joke for years even before our son was diagnosted. but covid times offered the perfect period to hyper focus on researching his diagnosis. which led to reading all my old school records. finding all the vaugue language being used to dismiss my childhood behaviors that in his records, were used as the basis of a diagnosis. was an interesting "oh son of a bitch!" moment.
At this point in my life, i only put effort into maintaining two friendships. Both of which are a couple decades old now. One is ND at the very least. The other was diagnost as autistic about six months ago, to absolutely no ones surprise. We really do tend to drift into our own little social circles of peace.
Actually it was my (former) partner, not me, who suggested it.
I was single when I started to suspect, but my parents were generally very supportive. Being ND runs in our family, and my whole immediate family has been diagnosed ADHD for like a decade. My mom helped me find a psychologist who would do a diagnosis and supported me through the whole process. My dad was accepting, but he isn't as keyed in to the psychology industry, so he wasn't able to help as much.
My partner said that he wasn't honestly surprised, but if it helped to get a diagnosis he was with me all the way. He's been super supportive and helped me find things that help with overstimulation.
I sometimes think I'm autistic but don't think it's worth getting a diagnosis. My boyfriend (almost 3 years now) said when we first meant he thought I was. He told me this a few months ago when I was going through an existential crisis of am I/aren't I. Full support. I suppose it helped that's he's ADHD and was in special classes when we was young. He only expects me to be me in all my awkwardness. Though, my sensory issues with too much sound, smells and sometimes visuals annoy him because he likes all that. Oh and I forget he can't read my mind when I respond to him internally but that's just a joke now. The differences will be there but it's the love and support that matter.
I've suspected it long before we met, but never really thought about it much beyond "yeah, I'm probably autistic. Anyway ..." and never talked about it either.
My partner was the one to first bring it up ten years into our relationship, thinking it was very obvious and said it explains a ton of peculiar behaviours I have that I never even considered to be related to autism.
I didn't think I was, but after my wife and son said I was I took some online evaluations. Since then I've read more and more about it. I've shared some of my atypical behaviors, like being a little too literal sometimes, having difficulties in conversations, with my wife and it has given her a better perspective that has curbed things we previously argued about. I think I'm seeing more why I don't quite understand other people, and my wife sometimes, so that helps preventing arguments.
His initial response was basically, “I married you, no matter how you are described!” He started reading up on autism though, and a couple of days later, he said very seriously that he had heard that many autists don’t like to be touched much, and since his “love language” is pats and cuddles and hugs, he wasn’t sure if he could handle that well. I replied that since we have been happily married for 38 years and have had three children, that I don’t think our snuggling habits are going to suddenly change. And they haven’t!