Background: Not too long ago I (35M) began my autistic unmasking journey. I was diagnosed with ADHD over 10 years ago, and shortly after I met my wife (NT 35F). About 4 years ago, I started to question my diagnosis and wonder whether I could be autistic instead, and have been in this slow diagnosis update, self-awareness, and unmasking journey ever since. In the meantime we had a kid.
Looking back, both my life and my relationship with wife have several tropes other autistic people can probably relate to. Always being the strange one and bullying target, hard to make or maintain friends, never got the diagnosis or supported I needed, learned to mask early, mysterious health issues no doctor can diagnose, frequently being misunderstood at home, school or work, thinking I'm just unlucky for not making progress as fast or easily as other people. Hearing myself talking about it right now sounds straightforward, but I just learned about autistic masking and its effects late last year, after I changed therapists to an autistic professional. You probably can imagine or relate to all the silent meltdowns, burnouts and existential crises I had for 30+ years of receiving zero support, and not having a label for them only made them worse.
Despite the extra burden and challenges, I got here. One looking from a distance could think we're a happy family, but we're not:
- We spend way more time upset with each other than otherwise
- Most of the fighting themes are recurring
- Even when doing something nice, most often we'll end up fighting
- Even for major achievements, we hardly ever celebrate
I understand that any relationship has its challenges, and that they take continuous effort to maintain and cultivate. So I don't think it's relevant to go into detail of what exactly happens, who does more or less at home and when, who starts fighting and why, what exact themes are recurring. I think many, if not most, of them can be traced back to clashes between ND and NT traits. Deep down, I feel that, despite any reason, if the happy moments outweigh the bad ones, either now or with a clear path to achieve it in the future, it can be worth it to keep going. I used to see a path, but I'm not so sure anymore.
So, why do I come here seeking your advice? Because, behind all the challenges, I came to the conclusion that the root cause possibly is that my wife simply doesn't like my true, unmasked self. She calls my autistic traits "problems that I need to work on" and says "I don't need labels, just need to work on the problems if I already know I have them". You know this story: despite monumental efforts, it's never enough.
This is my first post ever on any autistic community, and I have two questions for you:
After learning you were autistic, did you do anything to educate people around you (if there are any)? What succeeded, and what didn't? What criteria did you use to decide when the effort had been enough and wasn't worth it anymore (adjusted by the person's importance to you)?
In my specific case, what makes it harder to decide whether to stay or go is our amazing kid. Unfortunately, courts where I'm located at by default give divorced mothers full child residence rights, and my wife already said she wouldn't agree to alternate residences. So most probably I'd only see my kid once every two weeks. This means I could be trapped: either accept I may be staying with someone that doesn't accept me for who I am, at least until kid grows up, or give up most of my time with kid. How to get out of this?