I have several clients on the autism spectrum who frequently express frustration in their search for a partner. It’s something that hits quite close to home for me, because my boyfriend, who I deeply love and share a home with, has ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder).

Many people on the spectrum spend their lives being scolded by well meaning parents, teachers, friends, and partners for simply being themselves- for not emoting “correctly”, using the “correct” word choice in conversation, “incorrect” cadence or tone when speaking, or being teased for their special interests and routines.

It makes sense that if someone has spent their whole life being told that what feels natural to them is wrong, they’ll struggle to believe that they could ever find a partner who truly accepts them. It’s heart wrenching, especially since I hear the same story on a weekly basis with my clients.

Even more concerning than their feelings of hopelessness, is the shame I hear in their voice as they talk about ASD. It makes me so angry that they’ve been made to believe that they aren’t capable of finding human connection. It’s cruel, it’s harmful, and it’s bullshit.

After hearing similar stories from dozens of clients about their struggle in the search for connection, I asked my boyfriend if he’d be comfortable with being interviewed for my blog about ASD. He suggested that we write a blog about us instead, to showcase how a neurotypical woman and a neurodivergent man fell in love and are in a healthy, stable, fulfilling relationship.

Guys, let me just start off by saying that he makes me so happy, and I’m really excited to share our story. I hope it’s helpful for anyone who is neurodivergent and struggling in the dating world or other normies like myself who aren’t sure how to navigate an ASD relationship.

To avoid confusion and maintain his privacy, I’m going to be referring to him as K for the rest of this blog. K is sitting here next to me and his story is told in his own words.

*Co-Author’s note: K would like it to be noted that while he accepts the alias of K, he would have preferred to be called T-Bone or Fartiste.

The Prequel

K wasn’t diagnosed with ASD until he was in his mid 30s. Growing up, autism wasn’t really talked about (he’s 37) and his parents were immigrants who were even less familiar with mental health than your average American.

However, he’s known that he’s different from his peers since preschool, when he preferred to get lost in thought under the slides instead of playing with other children. He eventually learned masking behaviors that allowed him to get along with the neurotypicals around him, but he never felt like he could truly be himself around them.

As he got older, he realized that the expectations of his girlfriends confused and overwhelmed him. They were always angry with him for reasons he didn’t understand. They also wanted to spend a lot of time with him, so he was either chronically exhausted from masking 24/7 or they were upset with him for needing too much alone time.

By the time he turned 35, having a traditional marriage and family felt completely out of reach. He decided to start freezing his sperm and was seriously considering adoption or surrogacy with a live-in nanny instead of going the traditional route of creating a family. He couldn’t imagine finding someone who would be able to accept him, or that he could ever feel comfortable enough to be himself with a partner…. <cue dramatic music with a hair toss> until muthafucking Chloe walks in.

The Beginning

Approximately 3 years ago, I met K at a mental health convention, as we both work in the healthcare field. We chatted long enough to realize there was a connection, and when I had to leave for a workshop, he hit me with the sexiest of pickup lines:

“How do I contact you if I want to discuss the systemic issues with America’s mental health system?”

I gave him my number, and thus commenced the dreaded Year of Misunderstandings.

The Year of Misunderstandings

During the Year of Our Lord 2022, more commonly known as The Year of Misunderstandings, I was healing from grief due to the death of a loved one, dealing with turmoil in my family, practicing self improvement after a painful breakup, and working long hours as I grew my business. I was a busy, stressed, slightly toxic, pile of mess.

K had recently had a breakup and was making a final effort to find a life partner. He was on the hunt for a successful entrepreneur, hoping that he would connect more with a logic-forward businesswoman. He had just finished a cycle of freezing his sperm as a backup plan, and was actively planning out his future, excel sheets and all. Suffice to say, we were in two different places in our lives.

Apologies for breaking the 4th wall for a second, but we discussed at length how to best present how difficult our first year was. We decided to show a few of the more entertaining arguments, but there were dozens more that were a lot less fun for both of us.

Because we’re both hilarious, the interactions are funny to look back on… but at the time, we both felt perpetually misunderstood and hurt.

Our Recollections:

Chloe’s Recollection of the first year: The first year of our relationship was full of constant arguments. I often felt like he didn’t care about me. He said things I would interpret as thoughtless and selfish. My feelings were constantly hurt. I didn’t know where I stood with him. I wasn’t even sure if he was attracted to me. I genuinely believed that he was only interested in something casual, so I limited my availability to protect myself from getting hurt.

K’s Recollection of the first year: I had no idea if Chloe was actually interested in me for the longest time. We would have amazing, intense conversations and then she would disappear for days to weeks. During those days, I would wonder if she even liked me at all or if I was imposing myself on her. Maybe she talked to me out of obligation? She seemed to be busy all the time. Then we’d talk again and it seemed impossible to deny our spark, at least, from my perspective. I always left wanting more. I was confused as to how she couldn’t feel the same - why else would she disappear? I’m used to misinterpreting peoples’ feelings so my default is to not press too hard when I’m confused. I had no idea where I stood and so, I waited.

Here are a few examples of our interactions in the early days:

The time he was perfectly willing to watch me get eaten by a bear
K: We should go camping.
Chloe: “As long as you promise to protect me from bears.”
K: <very serious> “Uh… I mean… I would leave you, for sure.”
Chloe: “... You would leave me… to be eaten by the bear?”
K: “Yeah, I’d use the time he’s eating you to get back to my car.”
Chloe: “Would you go for help?”
K: “Of course, but it’d be more reporting where your body was, because you’d definitely be dead.”
Chloe: “Why wouldn’t you try to hit the bear with your car?”
K: “Chloe, don’t be stupid. Then you’d just be eaten by a bear while getting run over by a car.”
Chloe: “You could find a weapon and attack it.”
K: “The weapon would do nothing. It’s a grizzly bear. I’d just leave and report your body.”
Chloe: “Yeah, I think I’m good.”
K: <confusion>

Chloe’s Notes: Is it reasonable to expect a man who you’ve been dating for a few months to die by a bear attack in your honor? No. Did I want him to at least pretend that he would? Yes.

K’s Notes: My impression here was that the bear was actively attacking her AND we had specifically discussed it was a grizzly bear. If there was even an infinitesimal chance I could save her, I would do it. If a grizzly bear had her in its jaws, no man could save her. She wanted me to die with her. That makes no sense. The only thing me trying to save her would do is also cause my death. At this point in the relationship, I would die for or with her- but this argument happened 4 months after we started dating.

The horror of gm
K: “gm”
Chloe: “Are you upset?”
K: “No, why?”
Chloe: “You just seem upset”
K: “How? I just said gm.”
Chloe: “Normally you say good morning.”
K: “It’s the same thing with less words.”
Chloe: “Are you sure? It seems like you’re upset with me.”
K: “I’m not upset.”
Chloe: “You sound upset.”
K: “I’m getting upset now.”
Chloe: “Why?”
K: “Because I wasn’t upset. gm is quicker than good morning and means the same thing.”
Chloe: “Ok, I just wanted to make sure.”
K: <makes a mental note to always say good morning instead of gm to avoid the irrational rage of Chloe>

Chloe’s notes: If your boyfriend says, “good morning bb” every single morning for months and then randomly switches to “gm”, most people would worry that something was wrong.

K’s notes: gm was fewer words. I was tired. There was nothing more to it than that. I also had the exact same argument with an ex. I don’t understand why I’m forced to type the same thing but 10x longer.

The time I thought he called me ugly
Chloe: Why are you interested in me?
K: I got tired of dating hot girls. I wanted someone smart.

Chloe’s Notes: I liked that he appreciated my intelligence, but it felt like he was saying that he liked me despite not being attracted to me. This was intensified by the fact that he almost never complimented my appearance.

Ks Notes: I thought it was assumed that she was attractive. I wanted to express that I was attracted to her other aspects as well. I thought girls didn’t want to be viewed as a piece of meat, so I decided to tell her how much I adore the other parts of her. I was surprised when she blurted out during an argument that I’m not even attracted to her. Why would I date her if I wasn’t attracted to her? She’s beautiful.

The time he called me on the anniversary of a loved one’s funeral to tell me about how he was just hit on.
K calls me. I answer, sounding sad.
K: “What’s wrong?”
Chloe: “It’s the anniversary of the funeral of a loved one and I’m having a hard time.”
K: “Do you want me to distract you?”
Chloe: “Yeah, thanks, that would be great.”
K: “ I just got back from the wake of a manager who worked for me for years, and while I’m there, sitting right next to her husband, her daughter starts hitting on me. It was so uncomfortable. She kept smiling and saying nice things about me.”
Chloe: “... Are you telling me a story about sleeping with the daughter of your manager at a funeral… right now?”
K: “ Nononono, you misunderstand. It was a wake, not a funeral! Of course I didn’t sleep with her. But she kept hitting on me and her dad was right there. I wasn’t sure what to do so I started ignoring her” (laughing while completely oblivious to how offended I was)
Chloe: “Thanks for the pep talk, I think I’m gonna go.”

Chloe’s Notes: It’s a perfect example of the dozens of times K has unintentionally been insensitive in delicate moments. There was also the time I sent him a YouTube video about grief to help him understand my experience with loss. He told me he decided not to watch it because it was sad, and instead watched another video by the same author about a cool grocery haul. Duuuuude, come on.

K’s Notes: Ok, look, I know this sounds bad. At the time, I tried to come up with the first distracting thought in my head, which was an uncomfortable situation at the wake. I didn’t think far enough ahead and connect the dots between the death of a loved one and the wake of an employee. For me, it was, “haha I was put in this uncomfortable spot, laugh at me” to try to make her feel better. Also, she didn’t specify that she sent the sad video to help me understand her. I would have watched it, had I known.

The time Chloe misunderstood his desire for ultimate efficiency as an attempt to control her
K: “Uh… your peanut butter to jelly ratio is really quite bad.”
Chloe: “stfu”
K: “You’re ruining your sandwich and you are not allowed to make them for me.”
Chloe: <irrational anger>

Chloe’s Notes: his peanut butter to jelly ratio is fire… but there are only so many rants about efficiency a person can listen to in a 24hr period.

K’s Notes: With most things, there is a correct way of doing it. If you are not doing it the correct way, you are doing it…. the incorrect way. For example, there is a correct way to load the dishwasher, a correct way to make a sandwich, and a correct way to exit your car to ensure you take the least number of steps, maximizing efficiency. It’s not my fault Chloe spends far too much time thinking about hypothetical bear attacks and no time thinking about optimal peanut butter to jelly ratio while minimizing knife strokes.

Other women
K: “I think this employee is hitting on me,” <shows Chloe his phone>
Chloe: <reads texts> “Uh, for sure. Has she asked if you have a girlfriend?”
K: “No.”
Chloe: “Huh.. most women who are interested in you will find a way to find out if you’re single before they start directly pursuing you.”
K: “Oh. She asked me a few months ago if I was married.”
Chloe: “What did you say?”
K: “I said no.”
Chloe: “Why didn't you tell her that you have a girlfriend?”
K: “She didn’t ask if I have a girlfriend.”
Chloe: “She was trying to find out if you were single, and when you said that you’re not married, she assumed you were available.”
K: “Well, that’s her fault for asking the wrong question.”
Chloe: “K, next time a woman asks if you’re married, will you please tell her that you have a girlfriend?”
K: <big sigh> “I mean, they’re probably going to be confused because that isn’t what they asked.”
Chloe: “Please, just humor me.”
K: “Fine.”

Chloe’s notes: The number of women who have pursued him because they thought he was interested in them is exceptionally high. He ignores people when he doesn’t want to talk to them. His silence is interpreted as him being a good listener. Girl, he isn’t listening to you. He’s watching a YouTube video in his head.

Ks notes: I legitimately still do not understand this. She did not ask if I was single. She asked if I was married. If someone asks if you’re hungry, do you tell them you need to use the bathroom?

The existential crisis
K: “When’s the last time you went for a full check up that covers every aspect of your health?”
Chloe: “Uh, I don’t know. Probably never.”
K: “I’m going to schedule you with my doctor. You’re quite unhealthy and you’ll probably die young.”
Chloe: …. “Excuse me?!?”
K: “What are your expectations of me if you die?”
Chloe: “Dude, are we good?!?”
K: “If you die before I do, which you probably will because I am very healthy, and we are not married, I would like to find someone to marry. If we are married but don’t have children, I would like to use your eggs and my sperm to create our children, and then I will only have casual sex with other women.”
Chloe: “Do I get any say in this??”
K: “What’s your counter argument?”

Chloe’s Notes: It felt really overboard at the time, but now that I understand him more, it’s one of my favorite memories. He had just realized he was in love, and was trying to prepare for an emergency. Instead of the romantic speeches in rom coms, my man shows his love with in-depth planning of possible issues in the order of most to least likely to occur.

K’s Notes: I would be lost without her. I was trying to think of all the ways I could lose her and how to reduce those possibilities. I don’t know what I’d do with myself if she died. My life would be over. Thus, she needs to be healthy to not die. If she does die, we need to have clear expectations until I can master the art of seance.

The Big Talk

K and I fell in love and started spending most of our time together pretty quickly, but we couldn’t figure out how to communicate. As much as I cared about him, I wasn’t sure if I could be in a relationship with someone who rarely expressed affection and unintentionally hurt my feelings on a regular basis. He was sick of being misunderstood and getting accused of saying things he didn’t mean to say.

After a particularly horrible argument in which we discussed breaking up, we decided to sit down and hash it out. He asked me to be completely direct with him and to accept everything he said at face value. I asked that he consider my feelings when phrasing things, and to not shut down. We agreed that if either party felt confused about anything that was said, we would ask for clarification. It was honestly the best conversation I’ve ever had.

Within an hour, our relationship had fundamentally changed. For real. It felt like magic. We realized that almost all of our issues were misunderstandings. Hundreds of relationship-destroying misunderstandings. K communicates differently than most people. He says exactly what he means, all of the time… and he usually does it with the tact of a brick.

For us neurotypicals, conversations have layers. When you’re arguing with someone and they say, “What do you want from me??” they aren’t actually asking you to explain what you want, they’re expressing frustration and often trying to avoid accountability. When K says, “What do you want from me?” He is literally asking for a detailed explanation of what I want from him. He then considers if he’s comfortable giving what I’ve asked for. If he is not, he offers an alternative, and then we work together for a compromise. It’s like a contract negotiation with your best friend. When I expressed concern that I wasn’t great at negotiation, he bought me a negotiation kit and taught me.

What about the lack of affection, you ask? Beetch, I asked him to verbalize it out loud every time he thought something nice about me and every day since then I get a MINIMUM of 20+ declarations of “I love you”, “you’re so pretty”, “I can’t wait to be your husband”, “I’m so proud of you”, and “you’re the best” on a daily basis.

He didn’t do that toxic thing so many people do, where he said that he would change, and then after a week everything was back to normal. No, my man worked. It’s been over a year since The Big Talk. A year of so much daily affection and validation that I couldn’t carry it in both arms and a suitcase. We both worked really hard to save us, and I’m so glad that we did.

Present Day

After The Big Talk, we went from arguing on a daily basis, to having a few arguments a year. Seriously, no exaggeration. We argue less in a year than we used to argue in a week.

K is my best friend and my greatest supporter. He is sweet, thoughtful, affectionate, generous, kind, loyal, hilarious, smart, ambitious, and devoted to the people he loves. He’s also an extremely successful businessman, and he’s taught me so much about valuing myself and my business. He’s my biggest cheerleader. It’s so terrifying for me to think about how close I came to missing out on this insanely amazing person because I didn’t understand him.

For a year I thought he was thoughtless and selfish. I thought he frequently said offensive things because he didn’t care about my feelings. I wish I had realized earlier how hard he was trying, and how confused and helpless he felt in our relationship. I was so close to being yet another person who didn’t take the time to really get to know him. I almost lost out on the most meaningful relationship I have ever had.

A few months ago he was traveling for work, and he texted me on the plane:

K: “I don’t like that I’m so far from you.”
Chloe: “Oh baby, I’m right here with you. I love you and I hope you have fun.”
K: “No, Chloe, you’re not here with me. I am actively moving further from you because the plane is flying in the opposite direction.”
Chloe: “haha, I know.”
K: “I don’t like it.”
Chloe: “I love you.”
K: “I love you too.”

It feels like a pretty good representation of our relationship now. We speak different languages, but we’re figuring out a new one together.

A Quick(ish) Chat About ASD

This is what love on the spectrum looks like for us, but ASD is a big word that covers a wide range of experiences. We aren’t trying to suggest that our experience is universal.

Research shows that most people on the spectrum desire romantic connections, but they struggle more than neurotypicals to establish and maintain those relationships. For K, those struggles look like poor communication skills, difficulty with recognizing cues, and sensory overload.

Communication skills are his primary frustration. He is high-functioning enough that acquaintances usually don’t know that he has ASD unless he tells them. As a result, he’s frequently perceived as being rude or self absorbed. In reality, he hates polite chitchat and finds it tedious and stressful.

He loves his friends, but he doesn't care about your trip to the zoo last weekend. Honestly, most of us don’t care about your trip to the zoo- but K hasn’t mastered the ability to feign interest in the way neurotypicals do everyday without realizing it. Imagine how much your life would change if every time you pretended to be interested in a boring conversation, the person you were talking to knew that you were bored. Seriously, take a minute and imagine how that would feel.

As his neurotypical girlfriend, my feelings used to get hurt all the time when it was clear that he had zero interest in the story I was telling him. I treated it as though his interest in my boring story was directly connected to his interest in me as his partner. Obviously, it’s not, that would be insane. In fact, I sometimes get bored by his stories- I’m just better at feigning interest.

These invisible social rules about pretending to enjoy things we find annoying are so deeply ingrained in most people that we react with real outrage when we catch someone breaking them- even when we’d be just as bored in the same situation.

Mix in difficulty recognizing cues and sensory overload, and you’ve got a real mess on your hands. K hates small talk, struggles to accurately read how the person is reacting to him, while also dealing with a heightened awareness of their scent, volume of speech, and background noise. I’m continually impressed by how good he is in social situations, knowing all the work he’s putting into every.single.interaction.

It’s no wonder that sometimes he just doesn’t have the energy to fully engage in his talkative girlfriend’s rant about the limited availability of mangosteens… AND his disinterest in the conversation didn’t stop him from taking the initiative to research local stores that carry mangosteens, call in advance for information, and then wake up at 7am to buy them before they ran out of stock.

For myself, learning to remove my perception of his intent from his actions has saved our relationship. Once I learned to stop making assumptions about the reason for his actions and just, ya know, started asking him, everything changed. As it turns out, he wasn’t ignoring me because he didn’t love me. He was ignoring me because his brain was on fire and he needed a break.

It isn’t selfish for him to talk to me about corporate real estate for 2 hours while I feign interest, and then zone out when I want to talk to him about Critical Role. It’s actually kind of wild that I, like most neurotypicals, felt salty that he didn’t seem interested in what I had to say, when I had literally just finished hiding my own disinterest.

Honestly, I like K’s way better. The social rules we live by are really confusing and often counterproductive. Why should we both suffer through boring conversations in the name of love? Maybe instead we could learn to accept that not everything that comes out of our mouths is as riveting as we’d like to imagine.

For the first time in my life, I’m in a relationship where I’m completely comfortable telling my partner that I’m not in the mood to listen to him, I just want to vibe for a bit.

Ironically, as I’m writing this bit of the blog, he really wanted to break down for me the embarrassing amount of money he spends on pastries. I told him that I will listen for a minute, but then I need to focus- so he gave me a minute’s worth of content, told me he loved me, and moved on with his day. He’s not salty. He’s not pouting in a corner while trying to send passive aggressive messages that his feelings have been hurt. He just respected what I told him I needed. How cool is that?!?

Conclusion

Obviously, relationships are tough, and ASD adds complications. I’m not trying to paint rainbows and butterflies everywhere. I’m just trying to say that we almost missed out on something amazing because we didn’t know how to communicate with each other… and the effort we’ve put in to learn each other’s language has yielded rewards that far exceed what I could have ever imagined.

If you’re neurodivergent and you feel misunderstood in relationships, I would encourage you to sit down with your partner and facilitate a conversation about it. Be direct with each other, be vulnerable, be honest, and be kind. It can be helpful to repeat back what your partner said in your own words to ensure that you’re understanding each other.

If you struggle to recognize their cues, teach them how to express themselves in a way that allows you to hear them. Most importantly, if standard social rules aren’t working for your relationship, create new ones together. There are no regulations against it guys, you’re allowed to make your own rules. It’s how K and I invented Attention Tuesdays and Taco Thursdays… and they’re pretty bomb.

Chloe’s Final Note: The most valuable lesson I learned while falling in love with K is that just because he does not express something, does not mean he doesn’t feel it. Also, if I need him to express it, it’s my job to ask. Looking back, it’s bizarre to me that women are socialized so hard to believe that if their partner doesn’t give attention or affection without her asking for it, it means they don’t truly love her. It’s reinforced in every romcom and romance book in existence. She always chooses the guy that anticipates her needs… but like, what about the dude who does the work even when he doesn’t understand her? How is that not objectively better?!? It’s such bullshit, because when I tell K what I need, he jumps on it like it’s his fulltime job. I don’t need him to read my mind. I have a mouth. Direct communication is sexier than mindreading.

K’s Final Note: I thought I would always need time alone to be myself without having to worry about what someone else thought. With every other person I've ever interacted with, I've needed regular breaks from them. No matter how comfortable I was with them, I craved my alone time. I would plan around when I would get tired of socializing or having to meet their needs. Even in my fantasies, I never imagined that I could spend all day, indefinitely, with someone and never get tired of them. It’s a depth of love that I didn’t know I could feel. The hard part was understanding what she needed from me. Once I understood she needed more affection and more thoughtful phrasing, I started telling her every time I thought about how much I loved her. The problem wasn't feeling affection, it was saying it. The phrasing changes were more difficult, but she's a good teacher. Learning to love her how she needs to be loved is worth it. I'm finally in a relationship with someone who I can be myself with no masks, tactless as I am, and she accepts me. Now, my alone time is our time. It's a wonderful place to be.

I’d like to thank K for spending the past two days doing his oh-so-favorite-activity of writing about his feelings for the creation of this blog. I hope our story is helpful to those of you in similar circumstances.

Much love,

Chloe and K

If you’re struggling in the dating world or in your relationship, feel free to make an appointment or reach out to me directly and I’ll get you sorted. If you’d like to listen to us talk more about our relationship, check out our podcast Kozy with Chloe